On our own

In the past two years we've been on a lot of camping trips and this has quickly become our favorite family activity.  However, some time around Christmas I realized that we had never been camping on our own...just the 4 of us.  So, I asked around and got a great suggestion from one of my dad's co-workers to try out Purtis Creek State Park and it did not disappoint.  We left out on a Thursday afternoon, got a wonderful site on the corner, got the camper set up and proceeded to just enjoy being together...just the 4 of us.  We took a long bike ride, had a great hot dog dinner Thursday night, made some delicious smores, and stayed up REALLY late watching Princess and the Frog all cuddled up in one bed.  Friday morning the boys went on a bike ride while Rachel was content watching a movie in the camper - you can do that when no one is expecting you or waiting on you!  Then we went on a hike that turned out to take much longer than we had anticipated.  Clay got dad of the year award for carrying Rachel on his shoulders for about 45 minutes while hiking.  We ate lunch, played card games and memory, rode our bikes some more (thank you, Marc & Heather, SO MUCH for letting us borrow your truck so we could all take our bikes!), had a great taco dinner, ate smores again, and settled in for a wonderful rainy night.  When we woke up Saturday morning it was about 30 degrees colder than it had been the day before and it was raining hard.  It really was a great memory for us because the kids sat in the truck and watched a movie while Clay and I did our quickest packing and loading job ever.  I think we should give ourselves some kind of award for the way that all came together.  For some reason I was a little nervous about heading out on our own, but now I can't wait to do it again.   

Just two of the 157 (I'm not kidding) pictures Rachel snapped from her little spot in the bike trailer - I'll spare you the other 155, but just imagine these same photos from several different angles and at varying degress of clarity!



dinner time


the girl loves her movies


start of the hike


smores




we've come a long way since our 1st camping trip exactly two years ago

loving curly-haired Meme

The kids and I spent the first couple of days of spring break in Tyler to visit my Meme - or curly-haired Meme as the kids call her.  I LOVE going to visit her for lots of reasons (and top of the list is just because I love her), but for some reason everything just tastes better there.  Seriously.  She can set out all of the fixings to make turkey sandwiches and they taste 10 times better than if I set out those same things at my house.  I really don't know how she does that.  She makes lima beans taste like candy.  Ethan ate 2 entire sweet potatoes for dinner Monday night because he said he couldn't stop eating them they were so good...just baked sweet potatoes.  The same baked sweet potatoes I make at home and he'll eat about half of one.  Obviously we ate very well while we were there.  And part of the fun was that my mom made the trip with us which is always nice.  We hung around the house, took the kids to a park to play for a while (the same park that I went to on a date once in high school so that was a walk down memory lane), went shopping at a children's boutique, talked and laughed a lot, and played lots of games. 

Thanks to Meme and Nana, Ethan is addicted to a card game called 9-hole golf.  He really can't get enough of it.  He asks me to play every single day and we had to make a special trip to the store to buy his very own 9-hole golf cards.  We played about 50 rounds at Meme's house and have since played about 50 rounds here at home.  At least it's not Hi Ho Cherry-O! 


We were excited to have my Aunt Ginny and Uncle David come over for dinner and more games.  Meme had a marble board built for her and there's a game we play (I don't even know the name of it) that seems to have rules added and deleted at random, but it makes for great memories. 


And one of my favorite parts of the trip was having Meme read stories to the kids.  I'll never forget it.

A shark is on the loose

Ethan wanted to play soccer again this season which warmed my heart more than he'll ever know.  Once again my dad and I are coaching and once again Ethan named the team The Sharks.  I remember being in elementary school and playing against a team called The Smurfs and another one called The Gremlins so I'll take The Sharks any day.  I'm really amazed at how much difference a few months can make.  He really enjoyed playing in the fall but I wouldn't have said he was a great player or anything.  But this season is a completely different story.  I think something just clicked in his head about the rules of the game and the purpose of it because he's on fire...along with about 3 other boys on his team.  He scored his first goal in the first game, and then scored two goals in the second game last weekend.  I love seeing him be so proud of his accomplishments.  When I played soccer in high school and beyond I was the sweeper (defense) so I obviously didn't score any goals and it was always interesting to me how the players who got the pat on the back were always the forwards for scoring.  So, I'm trying to instill in him that I'm not just proud of him because he scored a goal, but I'm proud of him because he was a good sport and he tried his best.  Who knows if we'll stick with soccer in years to come, but we're all having fun while it lasts!

Before the game 
 

On a breakaway about to score


Me reminding the boys for the 73rd time which direction we were going


After the game showing Clay how many goals he scored

The weirdest chicken I've ever seen

Last week at preschool we had a petting farm come for a few hours as a treat for the kids.  It was a really cool setup and the animals were all great, but they had the WEIRDEST chicken I've ever seen.  The picture doesn't really do it justice, but it creeped me out a little that Ethan was hugging on it. 


And here's Rachel with her friend Payton checking out the animals (one of the perks of teaching there is being able to snap photos at random times of the day)


And in other preschool randomness, all of the pre-k classes had a picnic yesterday which meant I got to eat lunch with E which was fun


And here's R cheesing it up before school yesterday

Happy birthday little Levi!

SFB wanted to give a big birthday shout to our adorable nephew/cousin Levi David.  We love you very much and can't wait to see you next weekend.  Happy 2nd birthday buddy!

Birthday - 2008


6 months - Aug. 2008


First birthday - 2009


1 1/2 - Aug. 2009

And here's the rest of the (birthday) story

I'm happy to say that I finally have my camera back and I feel like everything is right with the world again.  I really did feel lost without it.  I wanted to be sure and record the rest of Rachel's birthday activities before she turns four and I've completely forgotten.  It is so strange that her birthday was just three weeks ago and yet I feel like we've had a three year old for months now.  I love making a big deal out of birthdays and this year did not disappoint. 

After her donut party, we went to lunch with Aunt Ginny, Libby, Levi and Nana.


That night my parents asked R where she wanted to go for dinner and she very excitedly chose Chuck E Cheese.   We had quite an "experience" there with an assistant manger who rudely told us that we could not bring outside food in (for Ethan) and she didn't really care if he had allergies or not because policy is policy.  I really wish I could have recorded Clay's reaction to that one - awesome!


Clay and I had decided earlier in the week to get R a real bike for her birthday, and that we should probably take her to pick it out to make sure we got the right size and the right color for Miss Picky.  We started off at Toys-R-Us and didn't have any luck, made a stop by Target and they didn't have any small enough, went to the local bike store and decided we'd rather be able to pay our bills that month than get her a set of wheels, so we ended up at Wal-Mart and found the perfect one.  I'm not sure if she's more excited about the helmet Mimi bought her or the bell on the bike, but she likes riding and that's all that matters.


Sunday was her real birthday which meant she moved up to the next Bible class.  She was a little diasppointed that Sophia wasn't there that day and she was the only girl in this class, but said she still enjoyed being in the big kid class.  (Tracy - we were loving Paige's dress!) 


We always let the kids decide where they want to eat and what they want to do on their real birthday (as if we hadn't been doing that all weekend but whatever).  She asked to eat at Chuy's (score on that one!) and then go to Build-a-Bear so we obliged.


That day happened to be Super Bowl Sunday so Rachel got to show off her booty-shaking skills at Joe & Kelly's house while we all stuffed our faces with a ridiculous amount of food.


And then the birthday festivities came to a close on Monday when we went to visit my Granny & Pa so they could give sister her birthday gifts.


She's already talking about what she wants to do for her "number 4" birthday so I probably need to start gearing up for it now!