May 1-5

 The kids have been playing outside a lot, with the weather warming up, and more daylight!  One day Lauren made activity centers on the patio, like in the first picture:  Jump Rope.  She also had "Bounce a Ball", and "Chalk".  There may have been more.

Bailey is always glad for company.

Lauren got these unpoppable bubbles for a Speech prize, bought with her Speech dollars.  They were pretty fun, and I want to make our own sometime!

 

This picture made me laugh, as every kid is reading!  Likely, Julia was reading too, for school homework!

Caroline chose this outfit one day.  Completely changed out of her first outfit, and put on her ballerina leotard.  She wanted a skirt and leggings to go with it.  :)

Blowing and catching bubbles.  She learned how to catch them and is so happy when they don't pop!

Little gardeners...they planted seeds from our alstromeria plant.  Last Fall they planted alstromeria seeds, and were so excited in the spring to see the seeds had grown!

Well, something grew...into beautiful yellow freesia flowers...but I'm not so sure it was the seeds from the orange alstromeria plant!

Using pink shovels and trowels of course!

Reading...note my zebra throw, that is supposed to be on the loveseat...the kids "steal" it all the time!

Lauren had her pink princess tent set up for several weeks, as her own special reading spot.  The zebra throw was in there for quite awhile.

 I made Caroline several hair bows in April.  I saw this idea to make bow boards to organize bows and clips.  I made two of them.  I bought two $5 picture frames from WalMart; covered the glass with fabric, pinned ribbons onto the back of the fabric, then put the glass back in the frame.

On the blog where I found the idea, the girl hot-glued her fabric onto the glass.  But I pinned mine onto the back; in case I ever want to use the frames as frames!  LOL

Anyway, this is the best solution I've found yet to organize puffy hair clips!  There is room on the boards for more (believe it or not, ha ha!!).  Those ribbons overlap and scrunch nicely.  ;)

I hung the frames behind the door in the bathroom where I do the girls' hair.  Perfect!

Back on the trampoline--no matter Caroline's head injury earlier in the week!  So glad she was ok!

Austin is always taking his shirt off when he plays outside these days.  Sometimes because he's hot.  Usually because he can; and his sisters can't!  Sometimes Lauren or Caroline will say they wish they could take their shirt off b/c they're hot.  And Austin will tell them, "Well, you can't!  But I can.  Because I'm a boy!"

April, Part 1

Back to updating!  What happened??  Soooo much has been going on.  I've realized, with the kids in school, May is just as busy as December, maybe even busier.  I still want to get caught up, and hope to with Summer vacation here.



This month started out with Julia and I doing some clothes shopping for her.  She is interested in clothes now--this has changed since about a year ago.  She is in Jr.'s sizes now, and that is an entirely different shopping experience!  There is lots to choose from, but sizes aren't consistent from brand to brand.  Layering is the thing to do--not for warmth, but pretty much necessary for modesty.  I don't like layers in the summer--I get too hot.  :D  But Julia likes it, good thing.  Here are a bunch of things we found at Aeropostale.  We also had good luck at Sears and Kohl's.

We stayed home for Spring Break.  The kids and I found plenty to do around here!  Austin spent lots of times building with Legos.  He built this car with a design he made up, using a motor and pieces from various sets.  The car really worked!  It ran by itself!  Future engineer, maybe?

Picnic lunch on the patio.  Caroline was so happy to have the big kids home with her.



Austin and Lauren had a "sleepover" with her in his room, on the floor.  Caroline felt left out, so Julia let her sleep in her room.  Caroline loved that!!!








 Julia joined the 4-H sewing group late, in March, and was involved long enough to make the last project: a quilt.  She finished sewing strips during Spring Break.  The sewing leader lives across the street and a couple houses up from us.  That is very handy, just to grab the machine and supplies and walk across the street!

 Lauren checked out a library book about making all kinds of costumes.  This TV was part of a costume.  Friday of Spring Break, Julia had her friend Elizabeth over, and they helped Lauren make this TV.  Lauren pretended she was a news anchor.  This is perfect for her!  She is always performing and wanting to be a star.  ;)

Dying eggs the Saturday before Easter.  Not sure what's up with him looking so wide-eyed??  Austin had absolutely no pink or purple eggs.  He refused to use those cups of dye.  Hee hee hee

More silliness with eggs and eyes.

 They all liked dying the cooked eggs so much, that once again, I let them dye the raw eggs.  They were very careful...none broke!

Pretty!

Easter morning--the girls!

The kids

The family

We went to church, then had a giant egg hunt in the back yard.  It was so much fun!  We had tons of eggs, and they were hidden all over the yard.  There was still some bickering at the end over who got the last eggs (Austin!!!  Lauren!!!).  But for the most part, the kids separated and hunted in different areas.  Caroline got to go first, being the youngest, and that was hard for the middle two, to wait patiently for their turn to hunt!

 Caroline is very interested in writing and drawing now.  She drew a treasure map, which she's holding here.

I made the "B" after seeing the idea on a blog.  I cut out a 12" "B" with the Cricut machine, traced in onto cardboard, then hot glued fake moss to it.  I bought a bunch of ribbon in March, to make bows for Caroline, and had plenty to use for the tie for the "B".

Having fun riding on the driveway

 And fun scootering...these two play together so nicely!

 With warmer weather coming, it was time to go through clothes again.  What won't fit next winter?  What might?  What to sell at consignment?  (Of Caroline's)  What to give away?  What to sell at a garage sale?  What to save for Caroline (Of Lauren's).  I save pretty much everything.  There's always something in the boxes for her to wear.  :) 

Julia's sorting was easier.  For one thing, she did most of it herself!  Plus pretty much everything from last year was too small.  And Austin was easy just because he's a boy and doesn't have the variety the girls do!  LOL  Shirt or pants get too short, and out they go.  He never has anything get too tight before it's too short.  ;)  Shoes get worn out, in the trash they go.

Austin at Karate

He is learning lots!  It's fun to watch him.  Usually I drop him off, go home to work on dinner, then Brian picks him up on the way home from work.  If Brian can't make it, I usually watch Austin practice.

Running his remote control truck in the back yard.

Seeing how he could run it on top of the trampoline.  :)

Don't Smile

Almost every day after school Lauren wants to get the mail. She likes seeing what we get and sorting it out. :)


Tonight Lauren told me, "L is such a nice letter. No bad words, like 'mad', start with L. Only lovely words. Like love. And light." Oh, and let's not forget Lauren... ;)

She also told me that all the girls in her class want to marry Justin 'Beaver'. I asked her if she did, and she nodded in agreement! I asked why, and she said, "Because all the girls in my class do!" Oh my! Here she's working on the cover of a book she wants to make about Caroline. She wrote the title a little later: Caroline and the Gumballs.

The other day we started this collage, the idea from my new art book. Lauren cut and glued the background pieces on Monday. Then we finished it this afternoon. I helped her with the curvier pieces, but she cut all the straight pieces and glued everything down.

She chose all the papers and colors herself, and I have to say, this is a good way to make quick work of scrapbook paper scraps!! She had no second thoughts about cutting wherever, and if she cut too big or too small, oh well, just grab another paper and cut some more!! That made me cringe a little. ;) {Kept reminding self: They're only scraps. They're only scraps. You haven't used them yet...} She was soooo proud of her work! And went to hang it in her bedroom right after she'd shown Brian.

Caroline joined us outside, of course, not wanting to be left out of anything Lauren's up to. Sometimes I tell them, "Don't smile" to get them to, well, smile. :)

Don't smile...

See! It works. I asked Caroline tonight if she was a little child. She said, "No, I not. I Sweetheart. And a baby, and a girl." She talks like any little kid now, but still has some toddler talk: when I put her to bet tonight: "I want the fowler pillow!" (flower)

Caroline also tells me almost every day, "You're my BEST, Mom!" Or, "You're my best thing EVER!" Awwww.... She consistently calls Brian and me 'Dad' and 'Mom'. All three older kids still call us Daddy and Mommy!

Don't smile....

A couple other Caroline things I recorded earlier:

Dec. 30: Brian and Austin were egging eachother on, cheering for opposing football teams. Brian said, "New York Jets! New York Jets!" Caroline joined right in, "Do Your Pits! Do Your Pits!"

When I put her down for a nap or to bed at night, she asks me, "Can I wake up?" I always tell her she can wake up in the afternoon. Or morning. :)

Our cat, Bailey, has been gone since the morning of Feb. 12. We don't think he's coming back. The first few mornings he was missing, I'd say to Caroline as we walked home from school, "I wonder where our Bailey went..."

Caroline: "You still have your Pongo, Mom."

Since the Last Post

It seems like not much has been going on this month, but yet we've been doing a lot of things. Caroline's been sick pretty much all of February. I took her to the dr. Feb. 7 b/c her eyes had been oozing green gunk for 3 days, and were all red and puffy. She had a cold leading up to that. Dr. said she had a sinus and eye infection and prescribed Amoxicillin. It was Caroline's first time having an antibiotic! She was a stinker about taking her meds the first few times, but then got to liking it.


These little girls play school almost daily. Lauren tries to do crafts with Caroline, and says she wants to teach her to count to 100, and also that she wants to teach Caroline everything she (L) knows. The other day Lauren pondered aloud, "I wonder if she'll remember what I taught her when she goes to Kindergarten..." :)


One of the kids' jobs is to distribute toilet paper to the bathrooms. They like to play with it first... Building towers. Building walls, then kicking them down...


Lauren asked me to take her picture in these PJs the other night. She likes the sparkles on them and wanted to make sure we had pictures of them! She came up with these poses herself.

I peeked in the big girls' room one morning and saw Caroline reading Lauren's Bible. She'd sat Panda right next to her.

Valentines Julia and Lauren made. Julia made all the cat cards; I helped Lauren with the caterpillars.

So. Caroline was on Amoxicillin a week, when I noticed tiny red dots on her tummy and leg. The dr. said to stop giving it to her. The pharmacist said the rash might get worse before it got better. It did. This was Tuesday, Feb. 15, after the pharmacist said to take pictures of the reaction.

Julia had a reaction to Amoxicillin when she was 5. Brian's allergic to penicillin. Austin, Lauren, and I are ok with it.

The rash got much worse! This was Wednesday morning after a shower with Daddy. Her face, back and belly looked as bad as her legs. :( Meanwhile, she caught a cold, right as she quit the Amoxicillin. Lovely. At least the goopy eyes are behind us [for now], but she's had a runny nose every since. Poor baby. :(

On a happier note: these books arrived from Amazon last week. I hardly every buy books. Love books, but hate clutter! I do buy kids' picture books now and then, but they read them over and over and over, and are almost like toys in our home.

I've been wanting to order the 8 Great Dates book since I read Bringing Up Girls last summer, and Dr. Dobson recommended it. One thing leads to another, and you see on Amazon, "People who bought 8 Great Dates also bought these other books:" So that is how the other Dannah Gresh book and the Vicki Courtney books got added to my cart. Hee! Julia saw the stack of books on the counter and right away started looking through them. I told her, "Stop it!" LOL She got a big smile, and said Mrs. B, her friend Lorin's mom, has those books...(Dannah Gresh's). I've caught her a couple other times trying to peek in those "mom" books and told her I have to read them first! ;)

Art Treasury book: saw this on someone's blog, and thought it looked neat. Lauren and I are going to make one of the projects today. Also saw Expressive Photography on another blog. Had that in my cart a couple months and decided just to buy it. :)

The Hymns book: my kids like hymns. They like new CDs. I thought it'd be good for them to learn stories behind some of them. We've listened to the CD several times already, and they like it.

One Thousand Gifts: Came across this book on several sites. Read the excerpt on Amazon and was intrigued. Started reading the author's blog, and thought I should have the book.

The only ones I've started reading is the Little book. It's good so far! We've read one of the hymn stories, and Lauren, Julia, and I looked through the entire art book. Looking forward to the rest!

These are the cute Valentine's chocolates I gave the kids. Brian made each of them a Valentine, and a bunch of coupons for me. They get creativity from their Daddy, too!

And, Caroline's rash is much better. She'll lift her shirt now and then, showing her belly, and say, "My dots are gone." ;)