It finally happened . . .

and it was enough to pull me out of my non-blogging stupor.

I dropped Henry off at school this morning. Took him into the gym where the kindergarteners line up by class. Kneeled down to give him a hug and a kiss (after waiting for his friends to quit hugging and greeting him) and when I leaned in to kiss him.....he turned his head away! Then he smiled at me with a guilty little grin that told me he knew exactly what he had just done and felt a little bad about it. I could NOT believe it. Henry is always the one asking for hugs and kisses regardless of who is around, but today he was getting hugs from his best friend Blake and I think he was a little embarrassed to kiss his mommy! I suppose I wasn't quite ready for that yet.

A few weeks ago, the entire kindergarten put on a musical show entitled "United We Stand" and it was so cute! There are something like 270 (?) kids in kindergarten here and they did an amazing job. They sang a few songs all together and then they were in groups of 3-4 classes for a few songs each. You could really see how hard they all worked to practice and prepare for the show.

Here's Henry with his wonderful teacher Mrs. Forsyth right after the show: And in other family news, we continue to become more and more Western....

We stopped at a garage sale a few weeks ago and the super-sweet lady running it fell in love with Henry. He was telling her how he's a cowboy and when he grows up he's going to be a REAL cowboy and live in the desert and everything. She went and dug through her son's old clothes and came up with a western style shirt with pearl-snap buttons, which she gave him. It's about three sizes too big, but Henry couldn't have been more excited about it. At another garage sale that same day, I found a cute little straw cowboy hat with a tie-strap under the chin. I thought Bridget would love it, but as it turns out Henry claimed it (see picture above) and gave Bridget his 'old' cowboy hat:

As you can see, she was thrilled about it. :)

And Jonah dresses as a cowboy about half the time. He isn't quite as committed to it as Henry, but for some reason the whole look just comes together a little more naturally for Jonah.

We had plans to take the kids to a really fun rodeo tonight, but it is supposed to rain all evening and I don't think I'm up for a rodeo in the rain. Maybe next weekend the weather will cooperate and it will work out. I guess we'll see!

Catching Up

I haven't blogged in so long, and it's not for lack of something to write about! We've been busy enjoying the lovely spring weather around here and I just haven't had quite as much time at the computer. I'm going to try and catch up a bit and maybe get back in the swing of things soon.

Without furter ado: the last few weeks in pictures....

We celebrated Sam's dad's birthday here at our house. Sam was out of town for the actual day, so we had a belated dinner/cake the following week.

Dave requested "wedding cake" which also happens to be my sweet husband's favorite. Here he is pouting because he is fasting desserts and couldn't even try the delicious cake!

And speaking of my crazy husband, here he is a few days after wiping poison ivy from his hand to his eye. Not a good idea when you're severely allergic! He couldn't open his eye for three days and had to see the doctor for a steroid shot.

Bridget has found my make-up and also learned how to open doors. It used to be enough to keep the door to my bathroom closed, but now she has overcome that silly obstacle! I told her she needs to wait a few more years before I'm letting her borrow my lipstick again. :)
Henry has taken to leaving sweet notes around the house for everyone in the family. That boy is such a sweetheart!
Jonah's best friend (and birthday buddy!) moved far, far away. He misses Hailie so much!

Our church had a family picnic day a few weeks back. The theme was "Western" and it firmly cemented my oldest son's desire to be a real cowboy. Here the boys are ropin' a cow while Bridget looks on.

Henry hangin' on the fence with his friend Westin. You know, like cowboys do.

Jonah getting his groove on to the square dancing music.
Just had to show off the littlest cowgirl's boots. :)

We also had a really fun trip to Colorado over Spring Break. I put pictures of that up on Facebook, and if I ever feel caught up on here I might post some here too.

We're going camping this weekend to celebrate Sam's birthday (woo hoo!) and also Easter. Tune in next week to see pictures from Oklahoma! :)

The Joy of Boys

I LOVE MY BOYS!

There is something very special about little boys. God made these incredibly manly, tough, sweet-and-sensitive but rough-and-rowdy boys and put them in these tiny little bodies that can't quite contain their big personalities.Henry takes a long time to process everything that happens throughout his day. Usually around bedtime is when I hear the best stories about what has gone on during the day for him. Tonight, about twenty minutes after I put Henry to bed, he came back out of his room sobbing.

It took him a while to get his story out, but the gist of it was that he had found a dead, dried out frog yesterday. Thinking it was cool, but not knowing what to do with it, Henry slipped it into his backpack. On the way to school this morning he moved it from his backpack to his lunch box.

At lunch time, Henry's teacher found the frog. (One of his friends told her that he had it.) She made him throw it away and apparently told some other teachers. Henry was devasted that the teacher was talking about him to other people--that is one of his great fears.

Even at the young age of five and a half (can't forget that half!), Henry already has pride. Yikes.

On another note, Sam taught the boys to shoot a bb gun yesterday afternoon! They were so cute holding the gun and they both were able to hit a tin can from across the yard. They were pretty excited to be able to hold a 'real' gun and actually shoot it!

I know I said it before, but I LOVE MY BOYS! :)

Bridget Strikes Again!

Sweet, innocent little Bridget. She never causes any trouble 'round here. She always tries to be helpful, however she can.

Like when she decided to unroll the paper towels for me yesterday. I'm sure she realized that they would be much easier for me to use if they weren't bound by that silly cardboard roll.

Or when she relieved all of the wet wipes from that awfully confining packaging that formerly held them all so nice and neat.

I do always appreciate it when Bridget empties the tissue boxes around the house for me too. It's so handy the way that she tosses them all around the room after wiping each one carefully on her nose. And then the lovely habit she has of stuffing them all back into the box? Priceless.

Thank you Bridget, for always keeping me on my toes! :) And at least she hasn't discovered the pennies yet! (That one's for you, Ginger!)

Tuesday at the Zoo

Tuesday morning I had to take Bridget in to the doctor. She had goopy, weepy eyes for a couple of days and they weren't getting any better. They were actually crusted completely shut that morning and she woke up in a panic. When I got into Bridget's room that morning, she was standing up, holding on to the edge of her crib and screaming. It was so sad. :(

The doctor diagnosed an eye infection, likely caused by allergies. (Poor baby, she's not even two and she already has seasonal allergies.) He prescribed eye drops that cleared up the infection in a matter of hours! Modern medicine is really incredible, isn't it?

Jonah went to work with Sam so that I could take Bridget in more easily. He had so much fun at Sam's office! He didn't want to leave when I picked him up, but it wasn't too hard to entice him once I mentioned zoo school.

It was a beautiful morning, just a little chilly because of some wind. Bridget was in great spirits despite her yucky eye and she and Jonah had a blast learning about birds.

Here are my two little dare-devils climbing on a wall. Bridget was quite offended when I offered my hand to help her, so I decided to back up and snap a couple of pictures. This is how high up they were! Not a bad height for Jonah, but he's four. Bridget has fairly good balance but she is still a toddler, so I was bit nervous.....I only stepped back to take the picture and then ran back to where she was. Hee hee. :)

Time to catch up a little...

I'm so behind in blogging these days. I just can't seem to get in the groove....but since I talked with my mom's husband Jim last night (Hi Jim!) and he told me they check my blog every night....I suppose I'd better get with the program! :) These first pictures are just recent photos of the kids.

On Monday my sister-in-law Amy was in town with her eight kids. (Her husband Brian is in Africa for a month right now--feel free to pray for him/the family if you feel so led!) Anyway, we went out to Sam's parents house and spent the afternoon with them (Henry skipped school gladly for the chance to see his cousins!), enjoyed a wonderful lunch (thanks, MaryBeth!), and had plenty of time to talk and catch up. It was a refreshing and relaxing day. I somehow managed to forget my camera (!) and didn't get a single picture of the monster play date.

We came home in late afternoon to get naps for the kids, and then around dinner time Amy and the kids came out to our house. They haven't been here since the house was in the building stage, so it was fun to show them around. We had a bonfire and roasted hotdogs and s'mores and the older kids all ran around while the littler ones took turns on the trampoline. It was a great time and we so appreciated Amy driving the little bit further to our house!

I got most of the cousins in this picture....

....and here are the two I missed!