saying good bye to baby james..

early in the month of june we said goodbye to baby james. he and his family are moving out of town and we will definitely miss his little face. obviously he isnt such a baby anymore.. but we have been calling him that since october of 2007 when his mom went back to work and he will probably always be baby james to us. i tried to get a few good pictures of james and his buddies on his last day.. but thats always difficult. so..while they arent necessarily good pictures.. they are pictures just the same! we will miss you little buddy. keep in touch...

every body loves pop ice!

april pics that make me smile..

march madness

we are having our own version of march madness around here. the kids and i are DYING to get outside a little! for the last month our schedule has changed a bit. weve been including time for coloring in the morning a few days a week.. half an hour or so. and a little bit of tv time. again, 30 min.. while i prepare lunch. usually backyardigans {always gracyn's request ;)} or barney {korb's personal fave..altho he is coming around to those back yard friends}. everyone else is completely content with either..as long as they have something to snack on :). we just move their high chairs into the living room.. they snack and sing along while i get things done in the kitchen. and then we move back to eat. the point is.. our mornings are pretty full. playing..coloring..reading books..tv..lunch. and then everyone naps. SO.. i was thinking.. after nap and before snack time {330ish - 430ish} would everyone be ok with us playing outside in the afternoons?? only in the back yard, of course. just a little freedom to run. and a little sunshine. i know that our little guy is SO ready to be outside by the time his dada gets home..he barely lets him change his shoes. maybe a little backyard time in the afternoon would help with that. what do you think? id love to hear your thoughts.......

as a side note.. there hasnt been a lot of photography going on during the day around here.. but being outside will definitely = picture taking!

january in review..

it was brought to my attn that its been awhile since youve seen these blue eyed BEAUTIES on the www...

so i thought i would post a few pictures that i took this month. we only got the camera out a couple of times. literally. two. since we were displaced from our playroom for a week.. a week that felt like a month.. we didnt take any pictures til the 14th. but it was well worth the wait. and the kids and i love it!

wanna check out our new playroom?

come on in..

we got this great new shelf.. to put toys on. but mostly we like to climb on the bottom..

like this..

and then we do it again.

love it!

weve been doing other silly stuff too.

besides just looking cute all the time..

we play a lot of ring around the rosey..

and we all fall down.

we make silly faces.

and crack each other up!

and then we look cute some more. :)

neglecting the blog

so.. things have been so busy for me personally. between my brothers big move and my nieces illness i havent taken much time to blog about anything else. here.. or on my family blog. i hope that you are reading the updates about macy. and i thank you all for being so wonderful to us during this trying time in our lives. your prayer and understanding mean so much to me. im sorry i havent done a good job at keeping up with updates.. but the good news is that i have been taking just the same amount of pictures. so even tho they will be delayed.. i will get around to sending them out to you guys and posting them. november and december are well documented around here. just not published. ;) its my new years resolution to get back on top of things with this blog! thanks for your patience. i love you guys and your babies!!

half way thru november?

so, november has been the official month-of-the-runny-nose. yuk. it has taken me a little over 2 weeks to make it thru my first illness of the winter. maybe it will be my first and only.. it turns out that ive traded in contant tissue-ing of my own nose for constant tissue-ing of 4 or 5 little noses. grace, james and gracyn have dad the runniest noses ever. korb and maddie havent been so bad.. but they definitely dont like all the cleaning. it hasnt really slowed anyone down. our days have still been busy and messy and fun. we have named 10AM-11AM book time. and they love it. they take turns sitting in my lap. and they love reading books that are familiar. when we read a new book, we have to read it for a couple of days in a row. i dare you to ask them what happens if you give a mouse a cookie. kennedy broke out a few christmas books for korb last night..so he shared those with his friends today. its so cute to seem them excited about story time.

we have also been talking a lot about letters.. we play with the fridge phonics all the time. and we sing ABC's a lot. and lately we have been playing with an old favorite of gracyn and korb's {was that really june 07..} - wooden block letters!

we have been talking about table manners too. i know they are only toddlers. the oldest only 26 months. but we cant start too early right? nothing major.. just keeping our food on our tables. :)

and in baby news.. GRACE is crawling! and pulling up! babies grow up too fast! and JAMES.. well i think everyone has seen what he is up to. CLIMBING. i think ive told him to SIT DOWN in the rocking chair about 1000 times in the last two weeks. gracyn and maddie have actually taken over now.. they tell him all the time too. CUTE little mommies.

have a great weekend guys!!