Saturdays are the Best!!

We are all well and thankful for another beautiful weekend!  Apparently a kid had my phone and snapped a few photos of Lily.  She's doing well.  We think she's probably about 14 now and we've kinda let her do what she wants.  Apparently that's eating.  A lot.  She's always been one to binge eat so we have to portion her food.  She begs for more each morning and sprints to her bowl when she thinks we're heading that way. She likes to knock the bag of food off the shelf and make her own buffet.  She deserves it for living in our chaos.  She's got a bit more "fluff" now because of it, but don't we all!

Another dramatic and grumpy female in the house is Charley.  She is a sleeper, still!  She would sleep 15 hours a day if she could!  Mornings aren't her favorite so every morning we're greeted with a grumpy face and crazy hair.

And Jackson is still amazed by everything academic.  He loved taking his class Panda on an adventure and comes home every day with new facts he's learned about the phases of the moon, the fires that happen in the chaparrals ("his favorite biome" he told me the other day) of Africa, and the syllables in every word he can think of.  He's so fun and drives me crazy each day.

We are headed out to Baby Lucy's Winter Onederland party to celebrate a beautiful baby and her parents. 

A Sick Little Buddy

It's a beautiful, sunny weekend and we are homebound with a pukey boy.  

We were out late with our Small Group and he was up early so when he was acting a little off, I just thought he was tired.  But then he sat down during My Gym and started crying.  And then he threw up in the car.  He's so sad to miss a birthday party. At least we can enjoy the beauty of the outside while we hangout inside.

And this one is feeling great!  Finally!!

We had another good week and enjoyed a nice night out to The Melting Pot while Nana and Papa watched the kids. 

Yesterday after school and before I picked up the kids, I stopped to get a tattoo.  It's my grandma's signature and I'm in love!!

Sorry, Dad!

We're Back!

It's the first day of Lent so all social media apps are off my phone until Easter.  That should leave me plenty of time to keep everyone updated and flooded with photos here.  How did we all get so attached to our phones. I just didn't like hoe much I reached for my phone out of habit for mindless Facebook scrolling. 

Especially when the kids are watching!of course they are soaking everything in as they watch us.  The good and the bad!

Things have been the same kind of busy and fun and chaotic around here. We're still waking Charley earlier than anyone would like for breathing treatments and we are thankful for Daniel Tiger who helps us get through them without much drama.  And this girl is ALL drama.

Jackson oscillates between so kind, mature and helpful and a stubborn, hateful devil-child.  And it can switch in a second.  This was a helpful moment.  He was so happy to be running around with Claire. Until she pulled to hard and he fell and then he ran after her screaming while Charley was faking tears in the swing because "I'm just not swinging at all.  Can't you see that, mom?"

We are keeping entertained indoors with lots of books, Legos, playdoh, markers, and tape. So. Much. Tape.  Jackson is obsessed with all kinds and our house is a museum of random papers taped to the wall. 

We are all very anxiously awaiting the arrival of SPRING!

Fall Y'all

I guess the good thing about sick days with Charley is that I can update the blog while snuggling.  Our has been just like every other fall.  Same activities but a year older.  It's fun to watch us grow:)

The first weekend we went camping with friends and had a blast trick-or-treating there!

We went to the apple orchard again for the fifth time!  So fun to have these photos.

Fall seems to be the worst for our sweet Bear.  We are already on round two of sickness with asthma flare ups.

But then there's this.  I LOVE this photo of her at Sonny Acres sporting the shirt Nana made her!

And the traditional How Talll This Fall.  The answers is TOO BIG!  My babies!  Where did they go?

I took a personal day to go to Johansens Farm with friends. JJ loved getting this pumpkin that was grossly overpriced.  Whatever.

We have some wonderful friends here in Chicago.  The Davises hosted a pumpkin party for the adults to watch baseball, the kids paint pumpkins and all of us eat!

Speaking of eating, I got the Halloween Villages for the kids to decorate.  They did that for about ten minutes and then this happened.  Oh well.

And that's a pretty good wrap up of our fall!

What Weekends Are Made Of!

***my Blogger app wasn't posting.  This was written October 1st.

Weekends have been great lately.  And they usually are in the Fall!  We took the kids to Kuipers for the fifth time a couple weeks ago! 5 years of family pictures in the orchard is so fun!

This is the first year both kids really understood what was going on!  Jackson was on the hunt for the perfect Apple and Charley was happy to munch on her's.

The best part about these photos is that Bryan has had the SAME glasses all five years.  The guy's in need of an upgrade!

Isn't he awesome? He's the nostalgic softie who made this family collage.  I chose a good one, for sure!

This sweet girls knows a good doughnut when she sees one! We all just had one...and a half.

I kinda freaked out a bit while the kids were on the tracktor and I saw how big they are now.  Where did my babies go???

This past weekend was a mini mommy vacation.  My friend Julie and her sister, mom, and friend were in the city to visit from Kansas City!  I happily tagged along as the fifth wheel and had an absolute blast!

We stayed busy but we could have done anything and it would have been perfect.

This photo captures it all.  Our friendship is 18 years old and is as good as new!

This weekend we are headed back to Jellystone for camping with Yogi Bear.  We upgraded to a site with electricity so hopefully we stay plenty warm! We'll post soon when we return!

WHOA!!!

I had no intentions of a blog break.  July 12th?  I was so happy to have recorded our camping trip on the way home and then I just stopped.  Whoops.  Clearly we've been busy the last 6 weeks!

I kept the kids with me all summer and we had a great time.  This was a fun morning after my Bar Method class.  The kids loved the different cars.

Mid July we headed to Nebraska for a weekend at John and Ella's lake house.  The kids have improved so much with swimming lessons and we all had a blast.

After the lake we drove to Kansas City. We were able to stay for a whole week and were able to see a lot of family and friends.  We went to Diana Rose, a Royals game and Oceans of Fun!

After we left KC we had one more stop in Columbia for Mikes graduation.  He has worked so hard and my mom is so proud of him.

Vacation was great but it was back to reality as soon as we got home.  Charley had her tonsils out and the next week was rough!

Luckily she was pretty much healed she. Nana arrived to watch the kids.  We were able to sneak away to Lake Tahoe for a wedding.

Now that we're back to school things are pretty normal again.  We're rushing all over do this activity and that.  Bryan is still keeping busy with obstacle races.

Jackson has been in Kindergarten for two weeks and loves it!  He loves doing homework...for now.

It's been a great 6 weeks but we're happy to be back in a routine!

Camping with the Kids

I grew up camping and I knew I wanted my kids to love it as well.  It's good for them to get dirty, experience camp fires, and become one with the bugs.  This summer I finally felt like the kids were old enough so we tried out Yogi Bear's Jessystone campground. It was 30 minutes away and oh so hokey but it was a perfect first experience.  Saturday morning we loaded everything up and we were at our campsite by 10:30.

I was so nervous our kids would be a disruption to others so I was thrilled when our camping neighbors had a 4 year old and 1 year old. Not only that, the dad had run multiple Spartan races and marathons and the mom was a teacher and sign language interpreter. What?!?!  How cool is that! They live in Naperville so we exchanged info for an upcoming play date.

This was our sins camp set up.  The kids were much more excited about setting it up than taking it down.

We were checking the radar since theee was a threat of severe storms.  After camp was set up, we headed off to the pool!

Lunch was at our site and was just sandwiches, chips, and strawberries.  Then I got too hopeful and thought we'd all try to lie down and rest. 

Well...only one person napped and it was daddy!!  While he napped I took the kids to the general store for a treat. They picked ice cream, a bomb pop, and popcorn for daddy.  Jackson was excited about his bomb pop and explained the colors to me.  Red was cherry, white was EGG, and blue was blueberry. 😀 he said he liked the egg flavor best.

After we woke daddy we played frisbee and bubbles at our site for a bit with our neighbors.

And Claire rubbed her face in the mud every time she got a chance.

The great thing about Jellystone is there was always an activity we could do.  While the staff left a lot to be desired in the area of musical performance, the kids enjoyed warchng the Dancing Through the Decades show.

After the show was mini golf and the play ground.

We ended the day back at our site for toasted hot dogs, pasta salad, and s'mores!  And more bug spray and dirt.

As always, Charley got her way and was carried a lot because "her legs hurted."  She doesn't make a very good passenger.

There was only one time that Jackson got a little weepy about not sleeping at home but after we convinced him we would be in the tent too, he was fine.  The kids did really well and awoke with the birds at 6am.

We had cold cereal and frosted doughnuts for breakfast before packing up and heading home.  Now, just 23 hours later, we are all clean, including g Claire, with lots of fun stories to share!