VBS

This month Xavier attended 2 different Vacation Bible Schools. Each one was a week long, 3 hours each morning. This was the first time he attended any kind of structured program for 5 days in a row. He was tired at the end of the week, but he had SUCH a good time. He came home every day singing and dancing and with a handful of crafts he had made. I love that he had so much fun learning about God!

Each VBS had a closing program. So cute! (He is the one dead center in this picture with the gray shorts on). The first VBS theme was SonRise and they turned the church into a wilderness campsite complete with artificial Christmas trees!

The second VBS was at the church where X goes to preschool. He was excited to have some of his preschool friends in his group. The theme there was Sky and everything was decorated with clouds and airplanes and balloons. (Terrible picture since it reflected off the stage lighting, but he's the one in front in the black shorts)

Wesley was chomping at the bit to be able to go to VBS with Xavier. He just couldn't understand that he wasn't old enough. I felt bad for him, so we kept talking about when he turns 4 he will get to go to VBS. He did get in on a few pictures and the closing program.

I am so thankful to all the volunteers at these churches that put so much time and effort into make this an awesome week for all the kids. They definitely had an impact on Xavier. He's been walking around the house singing "It's gonna be a cool cool summer...learning to trust in Jesus!" and many other songs from the week.

A Much Needed Retreat

This past weekend I had a much needed (and frankly, much deserved!) weekend away at the lake with NO kids. Yes, you read that right. This was the first time in over 4 1/2 years that I left the house for 36 hours with absolutely ZERO children.

AND IT WAS AWESOME!!!!!!!!

Love my kids and all, but gosh, it was nice to say have a little renewal :)

My time away was a planning retreat for the steering committee of my MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) group. This coming year I am the MOPPETS Coordinator for the group. I will be in charge of organizing about 100 kids into childcare rooms, finding childcare workers, making a schedule for the kiddos with curriculum and crafts, and various other things as well. This is all so their mamas can attend our 2 hour MOPS meetings twice a month. It's a big undertaking for me but I'm excited.

We were fortunate to be able to have our planning retreat at a beautiful lake house owned by family members of another steering team member. Not a bad place to spend some time, eh!

The weekend was an amazing and perfect mixture of relaxation, work, and prayer and spiritual connecting. I am really looking forward to working with these ladies this year. We figured out that between the 12 of us we have 26 kids - wow!

So when mama goes away it takes a small team of people to fill in. And I was very grateful for the help. Walter stayed home with Xavier and Wesley, while Elliott spent the weekend with my mom and dad. We decided this would be easiest so that Walter could take the boys to do some fun things that are just harder to do when you have all 3. They went swimming, and did a camp out with some friends. Poor Elliott ended up getting a cold while he was with my parents. He was totally content to be snuggled and loved on by them, but he was very congested and had a really hard time sleeping. Which meant my mom didn't get much sleep either.

I tried to put that out of my mind as much as I could because I knew all my kids were in good hands. I did send Elliott a picture of me on my mom's phone just so he wouldn't forget who I was. 

So now that I've conquered my first get-a-way I'm ready for more. Who wants to go on a trip???

Far Far Away -- Atlanta

Our little family of 5 loaded up in our "way cool" minivan and headed for a little road trip down to Atlanta. But of course we had to shine up our ride before we headed out.

While it's nice to have a clean car, the more important motive behind this task was to wear the boys out so they'd sleep well for the big drive. It worked! We drove overnight and all 3 kids did awesome. Elliott slept almost the entire way. X and Wes slept, ate snacks, or watched movies.

The consequence of driving overnight is that we arrived in town around 6am. Way to early to show up at the relatives house. So we introduced the boys to the WAFFLE HOUSE and went to a nearby playground to ride bikes.

We all had a great time visiting with Donna, Chuck, and Adam. The boys loved their pool and spent hours out there. They also loved chasing the dog, Tallulah, around the house. Poor dog.

While there we hit up our usual favorite place, the Atlanta Children's Museum. It was Elliott's first visit and he jumped right in!

 All that grocery shopping wore him out so he decided to take a nap on Walter while the older boys made some sand creations and painted.

Within walking distance from the museum are the Centennial Park Fountains. It was a perfect day to splash around so that's exactly what we did!

The rest of the pictures from our trip are apparently on Walter's and Donna's cameras. So, sorry -- pictures end here until I can get those others downloaded to me.

While in town we visited my cousin Adam's new office of Mowgli Games. They just created the SONGSTER game on Facebook and it's a hit! We are super excited for Adam. The boys each created their own song with a little help from "Uncle Cuzzie", and named them appropriately for their favorite colors: "green song" and "red song". 

We had a fun visit and now the boys ask almost daily when we are going back. They know it's "far far away" but still don't understand why we can't "just go there" whenever they feel like it.

While Walter was Away

Walter traveled a lot for work in May. It's hard to get anything accomplished on those weeks because I'm just doing full on kids all the time. But one week I was determined to widen the perimeter of our burm out front, pull all the weeds in it, and put down a fresh layer of mulch. Ya know, something that without kids would have taken me about 2 hours. Wanna know how long it took?  FOUR DAYS. The stopping and starting in order to take care of the kids was ridiculous. But I got finally got it done and I was thrilled to look out the front window and be able to see some visible progress for the week.

 That same week, I busted my head open at church and had to go to the ER. I was going to open a door, turned my head to look at Elliott in the nursery and someone opened the door, full force, from the other side smacking me right in the nogin. Thankfully it was an easy fix with a VERY EXPENSIVE COPAY worth of glue. This of course had to happen when Walter AND my mom were both out of town. A sweet lady from church drove us home and stayed with the boys while my dad took me to the ER. I was back home in time to put the kids to bed so it all worked out.

Photo Dump

Since I got my IPhone I'm a photo taking freak because it's so easy and convenient. Thus, I bring you a random collection of pictures of the kiddos doing their day to day stuff.

 

The End