Out of Dodge

Last weekend we took a little family hiatus just to get 'out of Dodge'. Every now and again we just feel the need to leave home for a little bit and do something different. So away we went to a nearby bigger city where my Beloved spent some time at the University doing research for work and the kids and I headed to the Children's Museum and the Zoo. (Did I mention the Zoo is free and fairly impressive?)

It was nice to get out and not think about school and just enjoy ourselves. We went to the Museum first and spent just shy of 2 hours there. There were all sorts of neat activities for the kids to touch and explore. All 3 of the kids liked playing on the wooden xylophone. I mean what kid doesn't love something that is designed to make noise?

Another thing in the museum that caught their attention was the Dream Machine. It was a neat car set up with sails as if they could go off anywhere their little hearts desired. The main attraction for the kids there was the fishing. They had a magnet as the 'hook' and you could reel 'em in.

They took turns fishing. I do have to say it was Kiersten who won the 'catch of the day!'

There wasn't a whole lot for Katie to do, as you can imagine. However she did find things that grabbed her interest. One such thing was this tank that had two small turtles swimming around in it. She just loved holding on to the tank and watching.

And while the girls were over that way Kiersten was in the belly of the whale (really a fish, but I couldn't help myself. Kiersten loves that song on the Veggie Rocks CD). Katie was interested but was not one to be lured in by any sneaky lookin' fish!

So after our few hours at the Museum it was time for lunch and the zoo. The kids and I headed to the zoo and had a picnic lunch. I couldn't believe how busy it was for a Friday early afternoon. Then I remembered that these kids were on the tail end of Spring Break!

The zoo has changed a little since we lived in this town. So there were some new things there that pleasantly surprised the kids - like this indoor carousel.

The zoo was a nice way to end the day. We'll have to go back again this summer as there were several animals that were not out - probably 1/3 of them. Nevertheless we saw plenty and had a nice time.

I Apologize in Advance

But I simply had to share this one. Keep in mind it is Friday, I am tired and things can be more funny when one is tired.

So my story. Kiersten came out of the bathroom just a little bit ago with her 'report' of business. (We have struggled several times with Kiersten over the making of 'business', as we sometimes call it, on the toilet. As a result she will tell us when she goes and will give details beyond that. I know, I know. A little yucky and a bit too much information.) She comes back to the table and says, "Mom, I made two big ones and a little pile of nerds."

Then Isaiah mimics, "A pile of nerds."

I wasn't originally going to correct her but when he repeated it I just had to. But alas as I am saying, "No honey, it isn't a pile of nerds. It is a pile of (burst out laughing) turds."

It was simply too much for me to spit out without losing it. Completely juvenile, second grade humor, I know. But like I already mentioned I am tired today. It has given me little fits of giggles ever since and I just thought it too preciously funny to not share. Hope it made you giggle too! Happy Friday & Blessings to you. :)

7X7 Update

This has been going well. :) Not surprising, I know. I haven't made it through the full 7 scriptures on a day just yet. I have made it up to 5 or 6, but not 7. We are working on it though and that blesses me greatly. To be honest it blesses my children greatly as well (again, not surprising). Kiersten gets the sweetest smile on her face when I touch her head and pray the verse over her out loud. I know I thought I wouldn't be bold enough to do the out loud version but it just seemed natural to do so and I have just rolled with it.

The funny thing is if I start praying the scripture over one of the other kids first Kiersten will immediately ask me if I am going to do her next. :) Something special is going on here...and I can only thank the Lord for pushing me to do this. I can already see how my heart and attitude are changing and I can see, in Kiersten especially, she knows the love (both mine and the Lords) that are driving what I am doing.

We'll keep you updated as we continue to persevere! I'll also have some pictures of our day out of Dodge (that's what we call getting out of town - getting out of Dodge) where we went to a children's museum and the zoo in the next post. :) Have a most blessed day!

Scared Stiff

I had a terribly bad scare earlier today. I was giving the kids bathes - everyone gets their own turn. :) So Isaiah went first. (He usually does as he is the first one upstairs and naked once the words 'bath time' leave my mouth!) Then the Katie girl had her turn and lastly Kiersten went. I tend to leave Kiersten and Isaiah alone for 10 minutes or so to play before I come back and they get cleaned up.

Today when I walked back in the bathroom to check on Kiersten she was laying on her belly with her head sideways and her eyes closed. I thought she had drowned! My heart stopped, albeit just for that one second when she wasn't moving. She sat up right away and could tell something wasn't right with me. I was so terrified. I had to move out of her site so she wouldn't see me crying and getting myself back together.

She had been laying down (in the 3 inches or so of water) on her belly to get as warm as possible. Why she didn't just start washing herself up once the water became cold in turn making her cold and get out, I don't know.

All I can say is for that moment when I thought she had drowned it was awful. We have been so at odds lately and I have not been the most loving, kind or gentle in my thoughts or words towards her. It just further confirms that I need to pray more about my attitude towards my children and just for my children in general. I would have been so torn up had she actually died given the way I have been treating her.

I have been trying to get myself to attempt this 7X7 deal...praying 7 specific scriptures daily for 7 days over each child. I was going to modify my scriptures slightly from the ones Miss Angie used as my children don't leave the house nor take a bath each day (scandalous I know!) But the more I thought over what I am actually praying for my kids I think those scriptures had best stay right where they are! Working on it. Ask me about it in a few days...please.

A Family Affair

This weekend was all about family for us. Isaiah turned 4 and we celebrated with just the 5 us on Saturday. Then on Sunday we combined an Easter dinner with an extended family birthday celebration.

The Biggest Man had a wonderful day. He started it out by opening his singing birthday card (played the itsy bitsy spider - which we sing at bedtime along with a little tickling :)). He adores these cards. Then he opened a gift from Grandma Darlene and Grandpa Denys. So cute he is.

We decided to give him just their gift in the morning and then wait until much later in the day to give him our gift. We have found that he is easily overwhelmed with multiple gifts. He simply wants to play with everything at once and has no idea where to begin. He was more than busy with that racer all morning long. He thought having a controller was just the hottest thing. And watching him use it....oh, so funny. The controller only has two buttons - forward and reverse. It naturally turns it wheels when backing up. Anyhow, he would be pushing a button and turning his body (like that is what made the car turn) it looked like he was trying to do the twist! So little boy.

Did I tell you what he wanted for his birthday? At first it was just bideo (when spoken by an adult that would be video :)) game. But then he wizened up and thought why not combine my two favorite things and ask for that? So it became a Hot Wheels bideo game. We passed on the video game as he has sooooo many more years where he can get into that and he has lots of Hot Wheels cars and we thought let's do something different.

So we got him -

a Geotrax Grand Central Station. This came with a train that also had a controller so he was in Big Man heaven! It is one of those type of toys that you can add on to. There are so many other little things you can buy to make a little city almost (did I mention this makes him easy to buy for at Christmas time?). It is neat because the train works just like a cog rail - we actually rode on a real one a few summers ago going up Pikes Peak. It means nothing to Isaiah, of course, but to my Beloved and I, we found that to be cool.

Then Sunday we celebrated Jesus and His resurrection. We went to church as a family! (A first in the 4 years we've lived here. Someone always seems to be sick on Easter Sunday and my Beloved and I have taken turns going with whichever children were well.) It was a blessing to sit, the 5 us, together through the whole celebration. Here are the 3 troublemakers showing off their 'get-ups'. As is customary only 2 of the 3 smiled and looked at the camera- aren't you so thankful they came up with digital cameras?

After church my Beloved slaved in the kitchen preparing an Easter feast. And a feast it was! That man can do wonders for the holiday meals. I couldn't be more thankful to give over my kitchen. For our feast we had some family over. The kids played and played. They were inside, outside, upstairs and all over enjoying their cousins and their cousins' new puppy (which remained out of doors). It was a good time of food, fellowship and birthday cake. What a wonderful weekend and how joyous a celebration of Isaiah's life and Jesus' life, death and resurrection. Hope yours was a blessed Easter too!

A BIG First for the Biggest Man

Just a quick little update on the no diaper situation for Isaiah. Well, would you believe that since that very first night we took away his diaper he has had not-a-one accident?! I have to say I was shocked and pleasantly surprised (make that very pleasantly surprised). Anyhow, today, just a few short days after turning 4, the Biggest Man did something he hasn't yet done....... he went and made business on the toilet without any prompting!!!

Every night before bed he goes potty and then we make him sit until he makes business. Then it is on to the usual bedtime routine of brushing teeth and story time. He usually sits for 20 minutes or so. Although lately he seems to have caught on and has gone much faster. So I was thrilled when I went to check on what shenanigans he was up to in the bathroom this afternoon(usually there is a puddle of water around the sink as he guiltily shuts the water off when I open the door) and found him on the toilet announcing he had made business! Does it get any better than that? :)

A Beautiful Celebration of Miss Linda

I had not written about Miss Linda again after mentioning my initial shock and disappointment at her decline in health. She went to be with Jesus this past Sunday, April 5th. I really wanted to wait until after attending her funeral to say something about this wonderful woman who seriously loved Jesus.

See, the neat thing, at least in mind, about Linda's situation is she had time and foresight to prepare for death. The funeral was wonderful - if funerals are allowed to be classified as such. Linda had made these Mary Engelbreit bookmarks for people to take home. There were these absolutely gorgeous recipe cards, scrapbook style, of a famous candy that she made as well as a CD(perhaps DVD, not sure) of a singing/dance number of Linda and her Golden Ladies that they made at her birthday party in March. It was just neat.

You know a funeral is going to be 'good' when you see on the program Music video of Linda and her Golden Ladies! This made several girlfriends and I fall to pieces. One of them asked if I would do the same for them when it came time. All I could say was count me in! Those ladies rocked the house.

Anyhow, to get pack on topic. The program also made mention that Linda had prepared a taped message she wanted played. It was awesome. The woman gave her testimony and all glory to God in a way only she could do. She wasn't the flowery worded type - more of the tell it like it is type. And boy, did she tell it. Even though it was sad day it was also joy filled. She was still there giving us her sass (as Miss Becca and Miss Margie would say) and using her good sense of humor to tell her 'life story'.

I walked away completely blessed and feeling that today, Good Friday, couldn't have been a better day to celebrate the life of Miss Linda.

Temptation & School Activities

Well (picking up from thoughts on previous post), we just have to start off with how tempted I was to take a snap shot of Isaiah and his underwear! For the most part he comes back out of the bathroom and gets assistance getting redressed. When he doesn't it is always a surprise to see how he did. Just the other day he had put them on exactly right...except for the waist through the leg hole problem. I could tell we had a problem because the Lightning McQueen picture (clearly seen above his pants in the back :) ) was askew. So I took off his pants and he immediately said, "I'm naked!" (it comes out more like, "I'm neck-ed!") The waist band was so large around his leg and was just 'flappin' in the wind which in turn made him feel naked. Oh was I tempted to take a picture before I put things to rights. I came to the conclusion it was mean....but catch me on another day and I might not be so compassionate! So funny.

On to school things. There are just a few pictures of the kids doing 'school' projects. One was dying eggs. It was a 'developmental' project, but I think I would chalk it up as an art project myself. The kids' really enjoyed seeing the eggs turn these beautiful colors. Wasn't so sure if we should do this one as we are constantly battling what the REAL meaning of Easter is. This was a first for us. So to offset all the egg/bunny stuff we have been doing the Resurrection Eggs. Two every day to walk the kids' through the meaning of Easter - Jesus death and (praise God) his resurrection.

Another project, or rather science experiment, was making parachutes. Isaiah absolutely loves science experiment time, which falls each Friday. He doesn't do school with us but the experiments he is all over. :) Here each one is modelling their parachute and their chosen passenger. :)

Priceless....well, almost

Isaiah had a first last night. His first time going to bed in big boy underwear. It was time and he kind of forced our hand. You see, he uses his diaper to his advantage. He is fully aware of when it is on and what that means. The other day he took a nap in our bed with me and my beloved was worried so we put a diaper on him. He had slept rather long and when I went to wake him up he was already up standing beside our bed. He had purposely stayed in our room so that while he had his diaper on he could do some business, if you know what I mean. Then yesterday morning he did the same type of thing. He woke up, stood beside his bed and then made potty in his diaper. Only it didn't remain there - all down his legs, his jammies...you get the picture. So we decided we would take the plunge and have him go to bed in big boy underwear.

He did wonderful! There was no accident awaiting me when I woke up. Well, almost no accident. I'm getting there. I came upstairs to get Katie and noticed their bedroom light was on. Isaiah was already up and at em. I saw his jammies were a little crooked and asked if he had made potties on the toilet already. He replied he had. Since he has some issues with getting clothes back on right I thought to check. He had his jammie pants on backwards...but his underwear, oh dear! First, they were inside out. Then he had his waist through one of the leg holes. Boys underwear are no where near as elastic in the legs as girls, don't ask why, so they were rather tight. Even on his little waist. As I am taking them off....well, there was a surprise waiting for me I hadn't smelled.

So it was almost a perfect first night in big boy underwear. I was proud of him nonetheless. It does boggle the mind though how he could go into the bathroom, climb on the toilet, go potty, get dressed and then go back in his room to do business in his underwear when he was just on the toilet. Oh well, you win some and you lose some. (Although the picture of how he put his underwear back on...now that was priceless!)