Prayers

The greatest joys I receive as a parent happen when I witness my daughter developing spiritually. Although she is supposed to be going to sleep, I just walked by Raegan's room and heard talking. As I eavesdropped at the door, I realized she was praying. Thanking God for mom and dad, babysitters, relatives, toys, friends.....you name it, and it is being prayed for this very minute.

How precious are the hearts and prayers of children. There is nothing sweeter.

A few Christmas pics

Greyson's new best friend - Erick's cousin Suzie. I think he may need to visit her in Austin soon.... :)

Waiting in line to see Santa while simultaneously trying to avoid the boy on a leash that was an expert on invading personal spaces. I think he ate more of Greyson's cheerios than Greyson did.

And finally.....risking copyright infringement and possible imprisonment all for the sake of posting this picture on my blog. Sorry Santa.

My other kids

When I'm not taking care of my own, I'm teaching my other kids. I teach 12 violin students, and Sunday we had our Studio recital. I know they probably don't read this blog, but I am so proud of them. I consider it such a priviledge to be able to teach them.

What?!

This makes two posts in one day, but I can't resist. So here's the problem with asking your daughter how the play she just watched with her Ama was while simultaneously running bath water.

Me - "How was the play about baby Jesus?"

Raegan - "GREAT! Baby Jesus got married to a MAN!" (With great excitement in her voice)

Me - "WHAT? Did you say Baby Jesus got married to a MAN?" (With great excitement in my voice)

Raegan - "No! Baby Jesus growed up to be a MAN!"

Whew. Talk about panicking.

Dirty Santa Party

Last night we got together at my Grandad's to play dirty Santa. We had a great time, and I ended up with two things I desperately needed - christmas decorations and chocolate. Here is a picture of the fam., and my dad holding the kids.

Iced in

Yesterday Summer, Mia, and Bode came over to play. NOT because they had no power and a fallen Bradford Pear on their new wood roof. Nope. We just wanted a little bonding time. All 6 of us under one only slightly damaged roof. The girls enjoyed any excuse to watch an entire movie, and Bode played in an exer-saucer for the first time. I think he's more perplexed as to why my whisk is on the saucer. That makes two of us.

Happy 3/4 birthday

My little nine month old angel.

Metro Gym

Friday we went to the Metro Gym with a play group from church. The kids had so much fun. I think some moms had fun reliving their gymnastics childhoods. I guess I wouldn't know much about that...I always had a book in one hand and a violin in the other. Now when we have play group at the library followed by the Civic Center, you can guarantee I will own that one. ;)

And the winner is.....

Looks like Raegan lost in the game of pool, and Greyson won in the game of drool.

Christmas wishes

5 minutes ago:

"Raegan, what do you want for Christmas?", I asked. "Candy, chocolate chips, candy bars, chocolate cake, and little red dots," she said. "Is there anything else?", I pleaded, (fearing that I have created this sugar-loving monster.) "I don't know," she said. "That's all."

First Cheerio and the Zoo

In that order. The cheerio happened a few days ago, and was soon followed by random table-samplings of all sorts (ie roast beef and spaghetti). Probably not recommended by my pediatrician, I am sure.

My mom and I took the kids to the zoo today. Ahhh, the beauty of a zoo friends membership. We saw the aquarium, meerkats, playground, and giftshop, and we were out of there. How all of that took two hours is a little perplexing. Maybe because I spent an hour of that in the aquarium just trying to get one family shot with Raegan smiling (yeah, right) and Greyson actually looking at the camera (yeah, right).  It never happened, but here are the best of the day.

Obligatory costume pics (and random naked ones)

So it's been a while since I blogged. I will try to do a little better this week! Halloween was a blur of tons of activities and parties, but for some reason I only managed to get pictures of my little Dory and Nemo together two days AFTER Halloween. No matter that the pumpkins we were posing with were nasty and rotting....they still turned out pretty cute.

Enter the wonderful tangle-free world of the hair straightner (Hence the slew of straight hair pictures in the living room next to Greyson.) Why have I never used this torture device until now? Looking at these pictures, it's hard for me to believe that these kids are related. Blonde hair, blue eyed German, and my little Choctaw Indian baby. The carrots and sweet potatoes aren't helping Greyson's complexion any, but still...

Pumpkin Patch

Raegan and I just got back from the Orr Family Farm with a bunch of kids and moms from school and church. I stress the word bunch. We pet animals (two to be exact), rode on a hayride, picked pumpkins, rode a train, and ate lunch. A few other events transpired in between these 'highlights" (pumpkin patch meltdown due to bumping heads with Brenna, salmon fighting upstream scenario in animal barn, complete lack of interest in pumpkin story time - devoured bag of chips with friends instead, and general bewildered look on the mothers' faces during and in between events.) All totally worth it for a few priceless pics with mom.

30th birthday - a week early

So unfortunately I turn 30 next week. I'm going to Tulsa almost every night, so we had to celebrate last night. Erick took me to the Melting Pot in Bricktown. Okay, this is such a romantic restaurant - I felt like it was our anniversary or something. Anyway, this may be my new favorite place to eat. What is it about dipping bite-sized pieces of food into a pot and then eating them? Eating is so much more fun this way. Maybe three year olds really do have it all figured out.... :)

Funniest thing I have heard today.....

As stated by my daughter 5 minutes ago...."Mommy, Daddy's taking a bath and he's hairy. You don't see that every day." Number one- I don't know why Erick's taking a bath at 9:15 in the morning. Number two- my daughter is watching entirely too much Brady Bunch, as one of the lines is "you don't see that every day." Let's just hope that line wasn't being used in the same context on the show. Yikes.

Goodbye green

Not that I'm not proud of my children, but this may be my greatest blogging moment thus far. Let me introduce you to my new kitchen, remodeled by my own Bob Vila (aka Erick). I have to document this moment that has been a year in the making. As much as we hated to see the 70s retro green go........actually no. We love this kitchen so much we are thinking of giving it a name.

I've just GOT to get that dog

So I figured I better put up a picture of my 2nd child, poor thing. He probably has half the photos his sister had at this age. It's hard to photograph a moving target, though. I'm not used to a 7 month old actally rolling and trying to crawl. Raegan sat....literally sat for an entire year. :)

This is Greyson's favorite place in the living room to crawl to - straight for the chairs that the dog sleeps in. And if you're wondering, yes, he is physically sliding the chairs back and forth on the floor. He's definitely a boy!

Rainy day playdate

So I'm an official blogger now. This is what happens when I am awakened at 5:30 in the morning by my teething 7 month old. Strange, yet productive things seem to happen. The dishes are washed, laundry is drying, my blog is up and running, and art play day has come and gone. Whew!

Here are pictures of the girls in Raegan's room. Eagerly anticipating the arrival of the trash man, (oh to be three again) and sitting on Raegan's bed. I can't wait to torture them with these photos someday. I can already see them in the senior slideshow at church......

Is this thing on?

So this might be my first official blog. Let's see if I have this right.....