The Wright Side of LifeThe family is one of nature’s masterpieces.

During our brief stay in town between trips, we participated in a hike with our homeschool group at our favorite little section of the Chattahoochee River Trail system.  It was a beautiful day and with all the many hours spent in the car driving to and from places over the past few weeks, we were all happy to stretch our legs.

While everyone arrived and did the usual potty breaks, gathering of kids and whatnot, Victoria was off in her own happy, little world busily picking flowers in the field.  She couldn’t have ordered up anything more perfect than a field filled with her favorite: yellow flowers

Meanwhile, Scarlet was finding a good hiking stick/pirate sword/princess wand.  It was used as all of those items in about a 15 minute period:

Linc, for his part, was once again merrily ensconced in the back pack carrier:

Regular readers of the blog will recall the nightmarish tree hole that Victoria was so anxious to live in, and into which she coerced Grammie to accompany her.  Well, here she is trying to talk several other kids (all bigger and older than her) into going inside:

Sadly, there were no takers.  Sissy was undaunted though and sat in her tree home for a few minutes:

I was truly bummed, since I had suggested the hike location, to discover that recent rains had swollen the river and creeks to almost 5 feet higher than normal (we did the very scientific Stick Test <poke a really big, long stick in to see where the bottom is> to determine that added depth) and even though everyone was sweating we could not get in and splash at our usual area.  After breaking for lunch some of the group broke off to begin the trek back to the parking lot and myself and another mom continued on.  It was a good opportunity to get to know each other a bit better and for her oldest daughter and mine to play together.

Scarlett and Hannah (or “Anna” as she called her the entire time, despite my best efforts to show her how to say “H-H-H-Hannah”):

The last three kiddos (well, last three walking kids – two babies and Mikayla were in tow also!).  While looking at this picture with me, Mikayla pointed out how ridiculously long Scarlett’s legs are:

About 2/3 of the way up a big hill, Victoria lost momentum and needed a piggy back ride from cousin – thanks Mik!

This trail was caterpillar heaven – we must have passed more than a dozen, with several more dangling from the overhead leaves.  Victoria found this “baby caterpillar” and carried it all the way back to the car, where we gathered some leaves and placed them in an empty easter egg for the caterpillar.

She’s “CHEEEEESE”-ing with her caterpillar friend (see it on her finger?):

Scarlett and Hanna found a big, fat one that they took turns holding on a stick:

Looking forward to our next group hike!

The Phillips’ Family annual Easter Egg Hunt was held on Sunday, April 17th and I was so relieved that we were going to be in town for this favorite event of ours!  We had been camping, then at the beach, and were in town just for a few days before heading out for a longer family camping trip… but nothing was going to deter us from attending.  This was our third year and so of course I had to dig up some comparison shots from the other two in addition to this year’s photos

Scarlett and Oliva – I can’t believe how big, pretty and grown up these two girls are looking!

Two years ago, when Olivia was 2 and Scarlett was just shy of turning 2 years old – at the time, I thought they looked SO big.  Funny!

Lincoln was happy as always – thrilled to be with daddy, and to watch all of the activity:

I am *trying* so hard to be mindful of taking a family photo at such events.  It can be difficult, because the kids never want to stop and cooperate, but I always feel disappointed when I fail to take the time.  Love my family!

Last year we did not get a family shot, but we did take a picture of the girls together before leaving the house:

Linc also had a fun time crawling around in the grass, tasting rocks and picking up and then tossing down bugs:

Cousins:

I really wanted a non-sunglass-wearing photo of me and Jim, however it was BRIGHT outside and we were squinting so hardcore when we tried that we opted to just wear our shades:

Babies + Cupcakes = delightful mess!

From two years ago, Scarlett also inhaling her cupcake:

Each year there is a big group shot of all the children – I zoomed in on this year’s one because I just thought it was so funny how much of a ham Lincoln was being.  When all of the kids started getting into position, he was yelling and trying to throw himself out of my arms to join in, but I was hesitant to let him sit on the stairs by himself with all of the other “big kids.”  I didn’t know if he would try to take a header down the steps or what.  No need to worry there… nope!  Instead he sat there preening and smiling at all of the people taking pictures for about 3 minutes straight.  Notice how he’s the only baby (or kid, for that matter) sitting still, posed and smiling at the camera?

Finally, it was time to start finding those eggs!  Scarlett ran right off, and managed to completely fill her bucket in just a few minutes:

Victoria moved a little more slowly, trying hard to locate the sneaky eggs that were a little more tricky to find:

So proud of his two litte eggs!

Jim always seems to end up with baby egg-hunting duty each year.  Here is a favorite picture of mine from two years ago, as he and Victoria worked to fill up her tiny basket:

Victory!  Time to settle in and start the opening, swapping, and best of all – eating the candy.

Thanks to James and Marcina Phillips and Amanda and Jason, too!

When Jim recently offered me the chance to go on a “work widow” beach vacation, I jumped at the opportunity.  I cannot emphasize the insanity of Jim’s schedule of late… well, actually for the last 4 months!  If we see Jim for a total of 5 hours during the work week, that’s a lot, and maybe another 5 total on the weekends – sometimes a bit more, sometimes a bit less.  It has been difficult on everyone.  However, the last big phase of the madness was slated for the week of April 9th – 17th or so, and Jim knew he would be literally living at the office during that timeframe, and offered to send the kids and I to the beach for the week.  I was excited for the chance to take the kids, and even better we would be able to invite Amanda, Olivia and Judd; they were able to join us for a portion of the trip, which was great!

I should note that I have a gap in pictures during the beginning of the trip, during which time Amanda was taking the bulk of the photos.  She is going to be forwarding those along to me, so I fully expect to have a Part 2 of this blog with additional pictures!

The drive down was long (about 8.5 hours), but all the kids did SO well.  I was truly impressed.  We caravanned with Amanda and her kids, and all took a long lunch break at a ChickFilA with a playground, which helped the restlessness quite a bit.  After arriving and getting relatively unpacked, doing the grocery store run and sleeping to the sound of the waves that first night, we awoke anxious to hit the beach!

However, in the mad rush of preparation for the trip as I had tried to think of any and everything I might need, and thought through all the different scenarios I had not considered one possibility: that Lincoln would HATE the sand.  That first morning we got all set up at the beach, the girls ran off giggling, jumping and splashing with glee and Lincoln had this expression:

That look quickly spiraled further downward into a refusal to be set down.  I was stumped!  Both of my girls had been SUCH beach babies, and I was mystified and a little lost on how to proceed.  Fortunately, both Mikayla and I worked with him over the course of the entire morning there, and by lunchtime when we headed back to the house he was at least willing to sit by himself for stretches of time.  Not looking exactly pleased about it, but it was progress:

After lunch and naptime, Lincoln was much more interested to actually play in the sand.  Being the redhead that I am, I had to rock out the afternoon in my long sleeves and under the shaded protection of the beach umbrella :-p  I should mention at this point that Linc decided sand was amazingly delightful to eat.  At first I tried to keep him from it, and finally I just figured “Oh well” and after several handfuls he mostly got over it.

(and in the picture above, that little girl is not one of ours – she was a friend the girls made and even when the girls left her she still played with me and Lincoln; she was super sweet)

Victoria, with her “sand blanket:”

See?  More thumbs up!  Scarlett did nothing but run-run-run the first two days on the beach:

Post-nap relaxing time of playdough for the girls, and staring at each other for the boys:

Wednesday morning, Amanda and crew had to leave for other family commitments later in the week and we were all disappointed.  We had so much fun – the kids loved having their friends along and so did I!!  Thanks for being crazy and adventurous with me, Amanda, and doing this epic trip on super short notice – love ya!

I was fortunate that we had plans for Wednesday afternoon and evening that softened the blow of their playmates leaving.  First, Grammie drove over from her place in Florida where she was staying for a few weeks and the girls were geeked to give her the grand tour, and she was also the recipient of an unfair amount of kisses by Lincoln.  Secondly, my Aunt Susie, cousin Corey and her boys were able to come over since they live just a few minutes away in Palm Coast, FL!  We had dinner out at Red Lobster (my girls’ and Gram’s favorite) and during the long wait time to be seated the kids all had the chance to play and get to know each other a little.  After dinner we returned to the beach house and the kids (okay, and me too) ran races on the beach for a good 30 minutes before we ended our fun evening with root beer floats.  I *almost* forgot to take a picture of the kids all together, but I managed to snag one before they left:  Scarlett, Victoria, Trevor and Nathan.  Corey, your boys are SO cute, sweet and smart.  The girls have talked about them several times since we left and hopefully we’ll see you guys soon!

Friday was our last full day at the beach, and we took the chance to walk around the downtown area a little, visit the pier, check out the weekly farmer’s market in the square and dine at the Flagler Fish Company.  I had chatted with my friend Erica during the week and she had mentioned that while visiting Flagler Beach just a week before (weird, I know) they had eaten at the Flagler Fish Company and she highly encouraged me to give it a shot and I was sooo glad I listened.  The food was simply amazing!  I couldn’t endorse it enough, and the prices were super reasonable – at least for lunch when we were there.  In our group we had shrimp, fish and fresh steamed mussels and everything was divine.  Grammie and the girls give it a big thumbs up!

Lincoln and Mikayla each ate a shocking amount:

And my mussels and salad were so good that I refused to stop eating when Mikayla wanted to take my picture:

We finished out our afternoon “downtown” (it’s very small and quaint) by walking along the public beach near the pier and trying valiantly to feed the birds, which refused to be fed.  Mikayla volunteered to wear Lincoln and they spent a good amount of time running around the beach, much to Linc’s utter delight:

Victoria really, really tried to lure the birds in with her special bird dance, to no avail:

Splashing around in a tide pool with deliciously warm water:

They wanted to play in this warm water forever!

The girls started to protest when I insisted it was time to leave the public beach and their little pool behind.  Am I the only mom out there who loves saying (in a super stern voice) things like, “No!  We are NOT going to have just ‘five more minutes’ girls.  We HAVE to leave and go get ice cream now!!” and watching their “uh-oh, mom’s mad” expressions dissolve into huge grins when they actually register the content of what I’ve just said…?  ;-)

At this point we’d been walking around for hours and everyone was feeling pretty tired.  I was carrying Sissy and Mik was lugging Linc around, but she managed to hoist Scarlett up and carry her for a block or two also.  I can’t say enough about what a fun traveling buddy Mik was, not to mention a big help.  Thanks girl, I love ya!

During naptime, Grammie hit the road and Mik and I did a fantastic job of procrastinating the clean-up/packing-up job awaiting us and instead napped as well.  When we all woke up, it was time for one last beach romp at our own little private patch of sand.  We even busted out the kite since we had gusting winds:

Scarlett actually staged this photo – “Mommy, take a picture of me and Sissy standing like this!”  :-)

“Now let me hold Lincoln.  Mommy, is this one gonna be good for the blog??” Love it!

Now at this point, we were having a super high tide – higher than it had been at any point during the week.  Linc was having fun and crawling all around, splashing and whatnot but when the waves started crashing almost to the rocks, he stood up and tried to climb up me.  Higher ground!

I’m going to print out the picture below, Grammie, and every time you wonder where Lincoln gets his curly hair I’m just going to point at this:

Last moments on the beach – what a great trip!  Can’t wait to go back to Flagler Beach, hopefully next time with daddy in tow:

We are part of a small group at our church – an independent little unit comprised of a few couples/families that gathers together once a week to fellowship and study.  During the past two months our group has struggled with work schedules, sickness and time availability to get together as consistently as we had been, so we were excited for our small group cookout and get together thrown by the Cook’s.  It was fun to have more time than usual to chat with everyone and of course the kids had a blast running around William and Shanna’s huge yard!!

This small retaining wall provided an unbelievably large amount of fun for the kids.  They would work together to get boosted up….

…until finally they all mastered the art of getting up and over by themselves.

Which resulted in immense feelings of happiness and pride in their efforts, as demonstrated by Victoria:

It was also a much needed break for Jim from his ever-hectic work schedule, and Lincoln was thrilled with all of the time and tickles with daddy:

Ever have one of those perfect afternoons?  When the weather is unseasonably warm and everyone heads outdoors, drinks tea and plays so well together that you wish you could capture the feeling in those moments forever…then you walk around to where the kids were playing silly games and giggling together for 20 minutes and discover mud plastering the entire front of your home:

Oh well, it was still a great time and that’s what hoses are for

We were so excited for our friends Chris and Elizabeth as they welcomed their second son, Joseph, into the world in late March!  The kids were all eager to meet him (but not as much as me!), but none so much as Lincoln which was surprising and hilarious.  When Elizabeth first brought him in, there was a covering over his carseat and Linc was really anxious to see what was underneath.

The big reveal:

“Oh my gosh, mom – there’s a tiny PERSON IN THERE, can you believe it??  Can I love it and squeeze it and give it endless kisses?!?!?” was basically Lincoln’s response  He yelled at Elizabeth constantly to put Joseph lower where he could reach and touch him.

All of the warm weather we were experience, coupled with rain showers here and there, made for some great playing-in-the-mud days.  Lincoln was really excited to dive right in the fray with his sisters, or so he thought.  Come to find out, he wasn’t sure whether or not he liked the mud after all.

Feeling hesitant, he armed himself with a sizable stick:

“Hmm, maybe if I dominate it by standing… EW!  It’s squishing!!”

Foiled!  The mud seems to be winning:

One thing this boy DOES love, however, is popcorn.  Set up for a movie with his own bowl on the floor

One morning I had to run a couple of errands and was packing up the kiddos when Scarlett declared that she would like to stay with Mikayla.  This was totally out of character for her, but I told her that was fine if she talked with Mik about it.  Sure enough, a plan was made and when we came back an hour later, Scarlett was all dolled up – hair curled, nails painted, lipgloss on and dressed to perfection.  It was some great cousin bonding time!

So pretty.  She is absolutely a 14-year-old trapped in a 3-year-old’s body.  I love how she is sitting and no, it was not posed!  That’s just Scarlett

Of course once Sissy saw her cute Scarlett looked, she wanted to get all dolled up too and Mikayla was kind enough to oblige.  Cutest sisters ever!

Later that evening, Erica and Elizabeth joined us for a work-widow’s dinner, and all three girls put on a spectacular dance show for us.  Love these girls!

On the last day of the month, we were treated to a visit from Meredith and Justin.  Gram made her famous roast beef dinner, and after much eating, playing chase and being silly, Lincoln went to bed and the girls were able to convince Mere and Justin to watch a movie with them.  Thanks guys for taking the time!!

Lincoln is standing and walking along everything now but has zero interest to take a step while unsupported.  The kids’ play kitchen offers a perfect place for him to stand, play and walk along the length – he is working on his chef skills, I’m hoping

During one of our dinners with the Sahli’s, I was able to snag a picture of Victoria and Sam – they are good buddies!  I love snapping photos of these two together, they look like brother and sister

Now, when it was time for our friends to leave that evening and the bedtime timer beeped, Victoria did her nightly “perfectly happy to full on cry in 5 seconds” routine, and I managed to catch it on video:

Scarlett, reviewing the instructions from Ikea, as she helped me assemble the new organizational bins for their room.  It was a big project to put them all together and reorganize everything, but it looks so much better now and we are ALL in love with knowing where all of our toys are, even if it means 5 to 10 extra clean up minutes each day.

With Jim working so hard lately and the insane hours needed to launch some of his projects, there were two options: 1) feel sorry/sad about it and how we miss him, or 2) talk all the time about how thankful we are that we have such a hard working daddy… and eat popcorn!  :-)  Because Linc is usually in bed an hour or so before the girls, I don’t mind letting them unwind a couple of times a week with a movie and some healthy, air-popped popcorn.  We all snuggle up together – often with Grammie or Mikayla too – and just enjoy each other’s company.

All of the other non-movie/snuggling nights usually look like this:

Jim did manage to sneak away for a special Daddy-Daughter date night with Victoria.  She was SO excited, and wore her Rapunzel (from the movie “Tangled”) dress and a fancy new flower bow that Grammie bought for her on account of the occasion.  She was sooo excited that she got overwhelmed and went into her “serious face” mode, which Scarlett tried valiantly to get her out of:

Scarlett, Mikayla, Lincoln and I were going off together on our own group date, and Scarlett was happy to model for us:

There’s the smiles!  I sure do love these girls.  I can’t imagine my life without them and I also can’t imagine their lives without each other!  They are truly best friends:

When Jim got home, he surprised her with a special date gift – her very own “Eugene!”

After opening it up, she had a grin from ear to ear until they left.  She is totally obsessed with Flynn Rider (from the movie “Tangled” and otherwise known as “Eugene”) and talks about him all of the time.  She even wants a “Eugene” birthday – you can imagine the looks that garners when she brings it up in a crowd.

So thrilled for her date:

Scarlett and I (please ignore my wonky hair which no one bothered to tell me was sticking up – thanks guys!):

Next thing we knew, it was time for Aunt Jen and Uncle Dave to arrive.  They were flying in and then departing with Mikayla for a weeklong cruise in the caribbean, and no matter how much we asked they just didn’t want to pay to take us along  However, we were able to enjoy almost a full day with them on either side of their cruise/flight dates and this allowed Victoria to corral Uncle Dave into countless conversations, crafts and dances, during which he was always a great sport:

Victoria is my artsy child, and makes me thankful everyday that I have the opportunity to homeschool my kids.  She moves at her own pace and will spend up to 90 minutes sitting and doing “crafts” several times a week; looking at books that try to teach colors, games that teach colors, or quizzing her with “fun” cards?  Noooo.  Her mastery over colors and shapes came from a need to ask for help in drawing this or that, or in trying to describe to me what other supplies she needed.  I love being able to be with her day in and out and come to realize at an early age how she learns best and most effectively.

It is so interesting to see the girls’ different artistic expressions.  Sissy is such an interpretative artist – below is one of her pieces and when I asked her what it was she told me it was the flying lanterns scene from the movie “Tangled.”  And you know what?  I can kind of see that – the floating elements, how they start out clustered and then spread out:

Whereas Scarlett is much more literal.  Below is her painting of Rapunzel (from “Tangled,” of course – they’re only mildly obsessed).  See in the middle the head, arms, legs, two big red eyes, and then the long hair shooting out of the top and wrapping below her feet.  Very precise attempt:

Finally, a couple pictures of silly time with daddy.  Scarlett and Jim making Lincoln laugh:

“Weeee!!!”

Valentine’s Day arrived, and we celebrated with… a trail walk.  Not exactly your typical VD festivities, but we had such a great time.  The Chattahoochee River offers so many terrific entry points for trail walks, full-on hikes, great places to splash in the creeks that feed the river (when it’s warm!), and the opportunity to fully, thoroughly delight AND wear out your kids  Who am I kidding?  It wears out the mom, too!

Victoria spotted a tree with a “cave” as she stated, and was able to convince Grammie that they needed a closer look.  I was thankful that I had the excuse of carrying Linc in the hiking backpack as a good reason not to go exploring in there – have you ever seen Pan’s Labyrinth?  I have and I still feel vaguely unsettled about it, let alone crawling into any tree holes.

In she goes!  She is such a brave explorer.  Thanks Grammie, for being willing to get down there with her while Scarlett and I stayed a safe distance away

Lincoln is the loudest of all of my kids thus far… those of you who personally know my kids understand how impressive that accolade really is.  However, he is also hands-down the sneakiest.  I have pictures similar to the one below of each child at about this age, but both Scarlett and Victoria would get excited, noisy and start squawking when getting into something they shouldn’t be – almost as though they wanted me to know what they were up to.  Not the case with my boy – he goes into stealth mode, and even digs around in the pantry quietly:

Now that Lincoln is eight-whole-months-old, he is pretty sure he is a Big Kid – he gets monumentally frustrated when he can’t keep up with his sisters and is pretty vocal in demanding equal treatment on all fronts.  For instance, when we went to the circus for Olivia’s birthday (and as a part of our homeschool group), Linc did *not* want to sit with me… he wanted his own seat and his own popcorn

Along those lines, when I took the kiddos to Moe’s recently after church (week 3 and 4 of “Work Widow” status), Lincoln DIVED for Mik’s burrito and refused to eat anything else:

The weather was so gorgeous that we made it a habit to take a post-nap walk most days.  The girls always end up a bit whiny on our return trek home and so we worked out some double-decker seating for them in the stroller while I carried Linc.  Goofballs

Yummm… Ribs!  What else is there to say for this picture??

And finally, a video excerpt that shows what a smart little guy we have:

The beginning of our second “Daddy has an insanely complicated work project to be completed in an impossible timeframe” week started with a playdate at the Cook’s house.  The kids loved having the opportunity to dig through someone else’s playroom, and Lincoln discovered that he would make a very dashing pirate:

You cannot keep this kid away from food.  He can smell you making/eating it from another room and will come crawling as fast as his little legs and arms can bring him!

“Muffins??  Did I hear something about muffins?!  I’m sure it was a simple oversight that I do not have one in my mouth this very moment – don’t worry, Mom, I will just snag one of the girls’…”

For the next couple of days, everyone had snotty noses which I have to assume was allergy related as no one ever got really sick.  We kept ourselves entertained by playing the piano in our jammies…

…or in Scarlett’s case, playing the piano in her standard issue uniform (princess costume + hijab):

We did some cooking and baking which resulted in a good amount of oats on the floor (shocking), and I volunteered Sissy to clean them up.  Although initially reluctant, she really got into it since she was able to use our new little handy kitchen sweeper.  Jim bought this for me when our Dyson had to be sent in for repair (seriously, I must be the only person who can break a Dyson within 2 months of owning one – eesh!) and it has come in very handy.  The girls love using it, and Lincoln really likes trying to catch it!

One of the things I love about being homebound for a few days is being able to notice all of the funny little things that happen when we’re otherwise rushing around or out and about.  For instance, being able to snag a picture of Benito-cat locked in a 3-minute-long staring contest with a squirrel out on the deck – see him outside, right above the door handle?

Both of our cats our indoor-outdoor and pester me all day long with their cries to be let in or out.  I probably open that back door 40 times a day without even thinking about what I’m doing… which is why I literally screeched to a halt when I realized that Sparky was escorting a kitten into the kitchen!  I was baffled, but couldn’t help noticing that 1) the cat was a mini-Sparky in color and they shared incredibly similar markings, and 2) the cat was clearly following Sparky around.  My assumption is that the kitten is Sparky’s and maybe the mama cat needed a day off??  I don’t know, but it was truly bizarre and I was glad that both Gram and Mikayla were there to witness the proceedings.  I was able to get a picture of them downstairs, enjoying a mid-afternoon snack break.  They hung out for a while, but then the kitten wanted out and hasn’t been back since.  I’m sure we’ll see him around more as the weather gets warmer.

Papa came by one afternoon, and nothing made Sissy happier than to have a good snuggle buddy:

One night for dinner, I tried a new, easy Chicken Fettucini Alfredo and by all accounts it was really good!  (I still can’t eat very much “normal” food yet without it upsetting my system~)  Mikayla was trying to teach Linc how to eat pasta “Lady and the Tramp” style, but neither of the girls would partner with her, so the task fell to Grammie

Let’s see, here’s the original inspiration:

Yep, I’d say they pretty much recreated the scene

I know what you’re thinking, and no, we never were able to establish who was the Lady and who was the Tramp.

We also spent a LOT of time coloring, painting, stamp-padding (yep, just invented that verb-), and dressing up dolls with our favorite Melissa & Doug stickers:

(the above picture is awkward, but Mik snuck in and snapped it while I was mid-conversation with Scarlett; however, since I am hardly ever in the day-to-day pictures because I am the one taking them, I thought it was nice to show us together)

One of the highlights of the girls’ week was receiving a Valentine’s Day package from Aunt Jen filled with story books, activity workbooks, games, special cards and money!  Thank you so much Aunt Jen, you have no idea how much they relished opening up the stuffed envelope and going through each item one by one

By the end of the week everyone was feeling great and we were ready to get out of the house.  Fortunately, we had a fun homeschool group Valentine’s Day party to attend!  Everyone brought their decorated boxes, cards and candy were exchanged, pizza was eaten and best of all – cookies were decorated and consumed en masse

Scarlett showing off her monstrously over-decorated (and virtually inedible) heart cookie:

I giggle every time I see this picture.  This is SUCH a perfect Olivia-being-silly picture – we sure do love her!  She was so excited to show me her cookie:

The kids all loved the create-your-own-Valentine-magnet station!  Great job to Brandee and Brandi Lee and any of the other lovely SASCH ladies who were involved in organizing the event.

Lincoln was so good and patient while I helped the girls distribute our valentine’s cards, then made sure they had lunch…he noshed on a pizza crust while I supervised some cookie decorating and craft-creating, and again waited patiently to be fed his sweet potatoes.  But then he’d had enough and wanted OUT; here’s his pitiful look of “I’ve been soooo good, Mom! Please-oh-please let me out!”

…”so that I can dig through all of the cards and candy while the girls are distracted!”

I am brutal on cameras, since not only do I take roughly 1,000 shots a month but I am notorious for throwing (literally) cameras in my purse/diaper bag/back pocket when I’m on the go.  They inevitably end up with sand/dirt/drool/crumbs in the lens mechanism or even in the “guts” of the camera, which results in blurry pictures if and when they take at all.  However, about a year ago, Jim purchased a top end Lumix camera for me – this was our nicest camera yet, but was also the 3rd or 4th in 5 years and so Jim made me promise to do my best to make it last as long as I possibly could (a more than reasonable request considering the cost).

My problem arose however with the larger-than-fits-in-my-pocket size of the Lumix.  That combined with my attempts to be careful caused a 3-month dirth of pictures while we were out and about since I was being both exceedingly careful to use the camera case (which was cumbersome to take out, unsnap the camera, etc.), and I felt nervous when I had it squeezed precariously into a pocket.  Jim’s solution – with a few subtle hints – was to surprise me over the Halloween weekend with a little Cannon camera.  It takes decent to good pictures, but most importantly I can throw it in my purse and/or slide it into my back pocket when we’re on the go.  Perfect!!…Except that I keep forgetting to download and edit the pics from my secondary camera, realizing that I haven’t dumped the contents for a month or more late one night when I spend 90+ minutes searching for a “missing” picture that I just know I took.

Lo and behold, here are some “missing” pictures from the month of January

Our church recently made a big move in location, and while there have been some people who have left, I feel that those who have remained are the core backbone of what makes the church so outstanding.  Whether new friends, old friends, or somewhere in between, we love all of you and are so thankful to fellowship with you!  One of the things our family has enjoyed doing in the past few months is really making an effort to go to lunch with other families in the church at least a couple of times a month… sometimes its just one other family, and sometimes it’s 4 or 5!  A quick snapshot from one of our boisterous lunches:

Our lovely friend Joannie has started a woman’s ministry at church, and one of the initiatives is a once-a-month ladies’ lunch/playdate.  The first one was at McDonald’s and the kids had so much fun!  Elizabeth spent the day with us and really enjoyed herself – I think she loves the noise and non-stop action at our house…for a while  She probably goes home and spends a solid hour doing whatever the 2-year-old version of meditating in silence  would be.  But you have to love that smile!

And THIS smile too!  He was the lone boy at the playdate, but he loved every second of it:

A shot from our “girls night out” dinner/movie date with Amanda and Olivia; at first site all of the girls wanted to take their picture with the tall lizard (from the upcoming movie “Rango“), but had second thoughts when actually standing right in front of it.  It IS a bit creepy:

We hadn’t gone to an actual movie in quite a while, maybe even several months.  Scarlett’s main concern was how much popcorn and candy she could consume, while Victoria had her famous “look”… the look that is in between awe and frightened tears, while she mulls over which it will be (joy or crying).  Fortunately, the movie we were there to see – “Tangled” – was epically cute and wholesome and we all loved it immensely.

Towards the end of the month when I was feeling much better, the kids and I went to visit Nana at her work and take her for lunch.  It’s always a fun thing to do and the girls get super excited about it, and so does Lincoln once we’re actually there and he SEES her.  Nana + Moe’s for lunch = biggest smile ever:

My two blue eyed gals  I managed to produce a mini-Jim (Scarlett), a mini-Nana (Victoria – see below), and ANOTHER mini-Jim (Lincoln).  Sheesh!  I guess our household can only manage one redhead at a time.

Lincoln was just hugging on Nana and giving her the best snuggles (I wasn’t jealous…much), and of course Sissy had to get in on that action:

Hopefully, I can be more consistent in remembering to empty the contents of my little secondary camera!

During a longish drive home today from a playdate, Lincoln was fussing and Sissy was restless and so Scarlett was inspired to sing them the following song:

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(to the tune of “Hush, little baby don’t you cry…”)

Hush little babies, go to sleep

Mama’s gonna make you some wa-arm tea

And if that tea busts into giraffes,

Mama’s gonna give you a wa-arm rug

And that rug will make you really ti-ired

And then you’ll for sure bust into sleeeeeep.

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Soothing, isn’t it?  While it simply prompted Sissy to break into song as well, it actually did the trick and put Linc straight to sleep.

The Saturday following my surgery was the end of our Recovery Week, and we celebrated by having our friends the Sahli’s over.  We had to postpone our original dinner plans from the previous weekend due to a rather ill-timed hospital trip, but in the end it all worked out to my benefit since they brought over dinner and all the fixings!  A minor organ being removed is well worth having Elizabeth’s home-made enchiladas and cornbread.

Scarlett and Victoria both love having Sam over to play, but Sissy *really* loves Sam;  Lincoln is so funny when another boy is in the house.  How can a little baby recognize gender distinction, and then realize “hey! it’s a boy, I want to follow HIM around!” at 7 months old??

Buddies:

I’ve been working on organizing our enormous cache of digital pictures from the last 11 years of our life together, and in doing so it has made it hard not to stop, go digging, and pull photos that remind me of any current ones I am editing.  For instance, when I look at the picture above of Scarlett, Sam and Victoria I think, “Aw, they’ll love having that picture to look back on in a few years when they’re bigger.”  Then I pulled this photo of Scarlett and Sam on the same sofa circa 2007 and realized Wow, they ARE older:

I am constantly amazed by how much alike and yet how different the kids look then as opposed to now.

The following morning, Mikayla was kind enough to get up with Lincoln when he decided to wake for the day at 6:30 so I could get a final solid night’s sleep before church.  I came downstairs and found them lying on a pallet in the living room enjoying some quality cousin-snuggle-time:

Although I know that all sibling relationships are not created equal, I have been a little troubled with Scarlett’s continuing lack of interest in Lincoln.  She’s not unkind toward him exactly, it’s more like he doesn’t exist… unless he’s bothering her.  It was such a radical shift from how she was toward Victoria (doting), and although she is sometimes sweet with him, I mostly feel as though she would vanish him from existence if she could :-/  And so I started praying about it – just really asking that God would work in her heart and help her love her brother more and more each day.  I also prayed for patience with her about this attitude, and I have to say there have been noticeable improvements.  She’ll now sometimes kiss Lincoln “good morning” and “good night,” and she’s started helping me change some of his diapers and whatnot.  Last week she even offered to feed him some baby food, and although it was somewhat short lived, I was still encouraged!

Lincoln absolutely LOVED having Scarlett feed him:

Me:  ”Okay, Scarlett, let’s not give him a tonsillectomy!”

Scarlett:  ”Well, I gotta get it IN THERE.”

Nana and Papa have started keeping DJ (Papa’s grandbaby) occasionally when Elishia needs help.  Once again, although the girls played really well with him, it was Lincoln who instantly gravitated toward the other boy in the house.

Lincoln is a total pacifier thief, which I find odd considering he HATES his.  He crawled over to DJ, who was playing so nicely and minding his own business and just popped it right out of DJ’s mouth and into his own!

DJ was very sweet about it and didn’t take advantage of his superior size to knock him into the wall like he could have

Jim is in a super busy phase at work right now, and although the kids miss him when he has to stay at the office late, everyone chips in to make a fun night with all us gals (well, and Linc!) at home.  One of our favorite things to do is to make a stage (read: spread a blanket) and put on ballerina skirts and dance.  Everyone gets involved:

We were so happy to get back to playdates!  During my recovery week, we basically holed up at home and we were ALL happy to visit with our friends.  The Phillips’ came over and we had a fun lunch and the girls played together while Lincoln and Judd spent equal amounts of time giving each other sweet kisses and trying to wrestle  I was also able to share with them the wonders of our new Teavana tea. Amanda really liked it, but Judd… well, he was a convert.

Loran brought over her crew and our combined total of 6 kids (!!) had fun running through the house and playing “jail” (read: we put a new gate on the lower portion of the stairs going up, and now everything north of the gate is “jail”).  Notice how Lincoln is all but sitting in Carter’s lap?  Yep, totally trying to get the ‘big boy’s’ attention:

Although not true 100% of the time, Victoria usually loves Lincoln to mess around on her and will lay down from time to time and just let him clamor up and over her.  Lincoln, of course, is all too happy to oblige

It’s good to be back to normal!