for mother's day

Although a day early (Saturday), for Mother's Day this year...

...we hopped in our car to escape the black flies and spend the day as a family.

...we went to Cape Elizabeth, Maine, a small town south of Portland, where you can go to Fort Williams Park to see sights like this...

the Portland Headlight Lighthouse, Cape Elizabeth, Maine

and take your shoes and socks off to walk in grass that feels like carpet! 

...we spent time at the playground where we enjoyed seeing the kids have a blast without shooing away those pesky black flies and where...

Ivy swung on the swings until she reached the clouds...

Letty discovered anything and everything there was to do there...

and Owen enjoyed being the captain of his pirate ship.

...we saw a "dog show," as Owen liked to call it.  (The dog show was a field where dogs were permitted to be off of their leashes...we saw a half a dozen dogs there as we walked from the playground.)

...we enjoyed a picnic right beside the ocean where you didn't have to swat at any black flies (can you tell how much we like black flies?)...

Doesn't Owen look like a miniature old man sitting there in his chair???

but we did have to watch out for the seagulls!

...we got to kick the ball around.  (There's no better sight for me than to see Daddy playing with his kids!) 

...we went on "adventures" but we had to hold on to our hats some as there was a nice breeze blowing, and we enjoyed watching the kites fly in the air.

...we stopped to pose for some pictures!

...and we enjoyed walks around the park looking at the lighthouse and all of the old fort remains.

Then, we left Fort Williams Park and headed to Kettle Cove, just a few miles away, where...

...Daddy surprised the kids with an ice cream treat on the way!  (oops!  forgot to take pictures!)  While we were there though, an older couple made a point to compliment us on how well behaved our kids were!  A great encouragement to us as parents and to the kids to receive such a great remark from perfect strangers!

...we got to explore the beach at Kettle Cove.

...but soon exploring turned into splashing around in the FREEZING COLD ocean water!

We drove home in a very quiet car as all of the kiddos fell asleep on the way home!

Once we got home, we got a pizza, had a family bike ride, got ready for bed, and watched a movie!

What a day - a day full of no real agendas - just spending quality time together as a family!

Who could ask for anything more????  I am so blessed to have a loving family and to be the Mommy to 3 beautiful and wonderful children.

BUT, there was more (if that's even possible!)...

The next day (Sunday), I got to enjoy a breakfast made by my wonderful husband with Ivy being my waitress, and this huge sign that Ivy worked so hard making...

together with some precious and adorable homemade cards by the kids!

 *************************************

Ivy, Owen and Letty,
I love being your Mommy!  You bring so much joy, love, fun, and happiness into my life!  You teach me so much more than I think I will ever teach you!  I simply cannot imagine living life without the three of you in my life!  Thank you for the patience, the love, and the grace you show to me day in and day out!  I love you!
Love, Mom

hiding

now you see her...

now you don't...

A certain little girl was helping herself to a snack today.  She wasn't sure if she should have been having one so she decided to hide from us.  Do you love how she hides?  (I guess she thought that if she couldn't see us, we couldn't see her!)  :)

letty's birthday - TWO!

Today, our baby turned TWO years old!  How did that happen???

Here's how she spent some of her day!

 She talked on the phone to her grandparents with all sorts of stories to tell, especially the one about her birthday.  "Happy to you.  Love You.  Hello.  Happy to you.  Love you.  Hello. (*repeat over and over and over again!*)"

She decorated her own cupcakes.

She loved hearing us sing "Happy Birthday" to her.

BUT, she still needed a little help getting the candle blown out.

She, unknowing to us, grabbed a birthday gift off of the kitchen counter and unwrapped it herself all while we were cleaning up the toys, and when we discovered what she did, she gave us this face, "What?  Did I do something wrong?"

She loved her new umbrella!  With all the rain we've been getting, she's been getting to use it quite a bit!

She loved the little girl and boy and birthday cake toys that Ivy and Owen picked out for her.

And, she feels pretty stylish in her new sunglasses.

Happy Birthday, Letty!

 

You are a joy, a delight, a lovebug, a jelly belly, a copycat, a smiley girl, a chatty patty, a cuddle bug, a little one who knows what she wants, and a one-of-a-kind.  We love you!

for smiles

I haven't forgotten about this wonderful little blog.  I just wish I had more time to write about life and family and all of the craziness that happens living life here; instead, I am choosing to devote my time to the two big guys in my life (God and Nathan) and to the three little ones I love to write so much about.  One of these days, I hope to develop this fabulous schedule and have a perfect well-balanced life where I am that amazing virtuous woman who is grounded in her relationship with the Lord, loves on, cares for, and spends quality time with her husband and kids, manages her home well, and has extra time for hobbies.  Okay, one can always hope, right?  I guess you will have to settle with these little surprise posts.

This post will be a mish-mash of a whole bunch of silly things the kids have been doing lately.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

For quite a while, Letty seemed to only pretend through the influence of her big sister and big brother.  Lately, she has started pretending things on her own.  It has been neat to see her bring her own little things to the kids' play time instead of just doing what she's told to do by her older siblings or following along.  Her first real pretend thing that she does is chew gum.  She'll pretend to get a new piece of gum, unwrap it, put it in her mouth, and start chewing often times chewing for quite a few minutes.  Take a look!  

We love some of the words that Owen says as he has his own way of saying things sometimes.  Our new favorite word he says is "marshmallows."

"marsh marsh mows"  Always makes me smile!

We keep our house pretty cool and since we've had a few weeks of some really nice weather, we turned our heat way down.  The good thing about our house is that we get a lot of sun coming through our windows which adds warmth to our home.  This day it was really cold in our house so the kids came up with the idea of laying in the sunshine to keep warm.  Can they get any closer to the nice warm couch?  I guess you can say, "Desperate times call for desperate measures."

Owen and Ivy created this design.  They had to take a picture of it to show Daddy because they just knew Letty would ruin it before Daddy came home from work.

 A couple weeks ago, it was spring break from school.  My only goal for the week was to spend way less time in our van. We had gorgeous weather so we spent A LOT of time outside around our house mostly playing with anything that was round - anything having wheels or balls.

 Letty's favorite toys to play with in the house are the Little People girls and boys and this yellow Barbie car.  She loves to talk to the girls and boys and ask them if they want to go somewhere and then load them up in the car and drive them around.  So cute!  

 Owen continues to love to play with his animals and people.  He has especially grown interested in dinosaurs.  For his rest time during the day and as a reward for pooping in the potty (that's a whole other story), he gets to choose a movie to watch which he usually picks the Land Before Time movies.  After watching the dinosaur movie, he'll take his dinosaurs and reenact some of the movie or make his own movie scenes.  Very interesting to see! 

Ivy has been playing teacher in her little classroom.  (Of course, I don't have a recent picture of that.) She basically reenacts her days at school with the note on the board from the teacher (in this case, Miss Ivy), the calendar, the special bubble, and jobs for the kids.  She even teaches how to write letters, new word wall words, writer's workshop, P.E., library, art, music, and so much more. 

And, just for fun... 

Are you smiling?