Ugly/Cute...

You know when an animal is so ugly it is cute? Sort of like a pig (sorry Nic) or kind of like Yoda from Star Wars. Well, look who we got to meet yesterday...

My sister in-law posted some photos on Facebook of their new, less than one week old, goat. We simply had to go visit! I think he is so stinkin' cute. Avery loved him. She scooped him right up and was snuggling with him.

Hi, little fella...named Snowball...is there any other name when you have a white pet?

He gave Avery a little chin rub and nibble.

Ok, maybe he is just plain cute and not ugly/cute.

There were also two Monkeys in the barn. These boys are ebony and ivory generation two.

You would think we own stock...

in John Deere. It is interesting to me that your children will learn what they are exposed to and the things that are in their environment. Bodie knows all too well the John Deere logo and colors. He sees them everywhere.

He can pick Elmo out of a line up. And unfortunely, he knows Michael from The Office and George from Seinfeld. Ron and I got a good chuckle one night when Bodie said, "George" when we were watching Seinfeld. What can I say, he is still awake with us sometimes and these are the shows we watch...oops! He couldn't tell you who Obama is or any other President for that matter. He has time for that I suppose.

Bodie also knows Jesus and can point to him in pictures and sing songs about him. So that makes me feel a little less guilty about The Office and Seinfeld. I'm just waiting for his next phrase to be, "...this is...American Idol!"

I gotta move fast...

because I had the boys sit on this pile of logs and I took a series of shots and seriously they were gone in like 30 seconds...onto throw things into the pond and look at the duck in the pond that really is just a decoy. Rowdy told Bodie it was a real duck.

I had the unique opportunity to have Bodie and Rowdy only this weekend because my Mom took Avery for a Grandma weekend. We had a great time! We went to Gilbert House and it was awesome! Super glad I took the chance to quickly take this shots of my boys!

Here he is...

As I said I was set on taking some shots of this young man...who looks like he could ask for the keys to the car anyday! I have more to post but am on to squeezing out more Spring Break fun and making every last second count!

Random...

I sat down last night at the end of a very busy spring break week to edit some photos. Something I like to do to unwind. I thought I will pick one photo of each of the kids and edit them and post them on the blog. This is what I came up with...

I am so mad at myself because I just don't have very many photos of Rowdy. So we are headed out today to get some.

I love the light in this next one. She was headed to school and the light just fell on her and the background stayed black so I wanted to turn it to a black and white.

If you look at the very bottom of the photo you can sort of see Bo's finger pointing...Well he was feeding the dog and kept scooping the food and dumping it and saying "one more". I turned the photo black and white and then I added some "grit" or noise and stole a color from his sweatshirt and put it on top of the photo at a super low level.


I love editing photos to relax and unwind. It is fun to create and to be creative. I have always loved color, art and the tools you need to be creative.

No Pink this time...

Note: When I was working on this photo to post of Avery, Bodie said, "Sister, Princess." So stinkin' cute that boy!

While we were out running around one day I thought I better get Avery a new dress for church because all of her skirts are getting too small and so are the dresses that she has. She is just growing so fast these days.

The dresses we had to choose from weren't that cute. At least, all the pink ones...pink is the go to color for Missy. Then I spotted this cute little black and white polka dot one. I told Avery that Grandma Mickie (my mom) would love it (yes, I use manipulation to convince my kids of things)...Black and White is her favorite color to wear. Avery thought that was good enough and we come home with this dress. I wish I would have stood back and taken a shot of her whole body because she just looked so cute in her non-pink outfit.

The Muffin Tin Lunch...

I introduced Bodie to his first Muffin Tin Lunch. He loved it! I have done a post about this before. It is a fun thing to do at snack time or meal time. You just take a muffin tin (any size) and fill the little cups with the items on the menu. It is a fun way to change things up at meal time. I think he actually ate more lunch because he was having such a good time!

We took a picture together and he thought that was pretty darn cool too! "See it?" he would say after I took the picture.

B-O-Y!

It has been so nice having him home for Spring Break! I love staring at his little freckles on his nose and cheeks...I had the same ones when I was his age!


And this is Rowdy's latest accomplishment in the "stupid human tricks" catagory of things you learn once you start attending elementary school. Actually, I taught him how to do it but he has all sorts of things that he says and does because he learned it at school or on the bus ride home. Lovely!

March 12 of 12...

I was actually not too excited about lugging my camera around for the 12 of 12 this month because we had a bunch of running around to do. The kids didn't have school. It ended up being a pretty good day but we were all so tired once the day came to a close. I had to fudge some of the photos and use some shots from other days this month so that I could get 24 images. Enjoy this little peek into our day last Friday!


1. I straightened my hair the night before
2. French Toast for everyone! We like to sprinkle "snow" (powdered sugar) on top!
3. Avery showing off her latest pipe cleaner art...I think it is a really good flower.
4. I guess not everyone had french toast...I had my protein pancakes.
5. Target with all the kids in tow.
6. Rowdy found a Captain Underpants book he had been wanting and he had 1/3 of it read by the time we got to the check out.
7. Avery discovering the pains of shoe shopping...all the shoes she liked weren't in her size...I hate when that happens.
8. Bodie snacking from the box of "Granola Bites" (something new for us) that we got from the food section.
9. We met Dada for lunch at Applebee's. We always play tic tac toe to pass the time until the food comes.
10. Avery and I played too!
11. Bodie liked the chips and salsa that came with our spinach artichoke dip.
12. After lunch we went to Payless Shoes to buy Avery some new dance shoes. (totally overdue for these)



13. Then off to Toys R Us to return some toys that were defective from Christmas. I still had the receipt and it was $25 worth of stuff so we picked out some new toys!
14. Avery chose some Littlest Pet Shop cats to add to her collection.
15. Rowdy picked out these two Chargers. They have been the toy of choice everyday since. Bodie wanted Candy!
16. My handsome son!
17. Spring is Springing.
18. I love this tree...and I don't even know what it is?
19. We have been blowing lots of bubbles lately.
20. I love having fresh cut flowers in the house.
21. Fajitas for dinner...Yum!
22. For sure the best moment of the day was when I saved one of my Compact Flash cards from my hard drive. I just put it in on a funny angle and it just vanished. Well, I took the panal off the side off my tower and very carefully figured out how get that little sucker out of the 5 and 1 card reader. You can see where it was hiding it is the little black and red thing inside that little box. I ROCK if I do say so myself!
23. This is what Rowdy was thinking about as he drifted off to sleep because we had big plans to go see this amazing engine on Saturday.
24. This photo was not taken on the 12th but was way too cute to leave out!

Chasing Trains!

As I have mentioned before Rowdy is a train junkie! But he isn't just into Thomas and toy trains, he knows about the real thing too. He has several train documentories that have been gifts from family. He has learned a lot about steam engines this way. By the way, steam engines are far superior to diesels, in Rowdy's mind.

Saturday we went to the Union Station. Yep, we went to the train station in Portland for no other reason than to hang out and hope that we would get to see some trains in action. Unfortunately, we didn't get to see any trains coming or going, but we still had fun!
Bodie was so brave to walk onto this bridge. It was pretty high up, it even made me a little nervous. He was watching that train on the right and he kept saying "boo-let wrain" (bullet train). See, only in my house would a two year old call a train "bullet train" after the Shinkansen in Japan.

Rowdy with his cousin Evan, who shares the same love of trains. Avery wanted nothing to do with the bridge and was perfectly content to stay back with my Mom.


Although, we didn't see any trains coming or going we had bigger and better plans up our sleeve. We went back to the roundhouse that I mentioned several weeks ago and the doors were open this time! Yes!

This the the "famous" 4449 or Daylight. This steam engine is quite a site. Needless to say it is HUGE! The photo doesn't do it justice. I was talking to my brother (Evan's Dad) about how we feel about these trains and he put it well when he said, "I don't know why but, they just kind of get in your blood." I agree because as silly as it sounds when I see these amazing engines in person I get teary eyed. I don't know if it is because they are truly massive and awesome, or that I am excited for Rowdy or just the fact that I am witnessing part of American history. When I told my brother the I get teary eyed he said, "I do too!"

It's a big deal!

So we did a little ponytail to school last week and she loved it! Later in the day when we were at dance class I was fixing her pony tail because it was a bit loose and she told me to put it lower...I knew exactly why she told me to do this. As she pranced off to take her place on the dance floor she had her head up and was swishing her head from side to side to see if she could feel her ponytail on her back...cute girl!

One, two, wife...

Totally funny that I caught this...I was taking some pictures of something Avery was doing and Bodie was sitting across the table getting into some homework that Avery was working on. He had his little fingers out and was counting...He still skips three and four and pronounces five like wife....One, Two, Wife! When I encourage him to say three it is so cute to watch him try to get his tongue to make the "thhhhhh" sound.

Avery...

As I was working on the post below I was noticing how long Avery's hair is in comparison to this fall when she started school. She has only had two trims in her whole life. Time will only tell if she will have hair like mine that is 100% OOC (out of control). I also think that her face is a little less chubby...I hate that! I hate how they slowly, slowly lose all evidence of the "baby" in them.

March 5th, 2010....

September 8th, 2009....

"Sussick, Blease!"

That is how Bodie asks for the music to be turned on. Often, when I have some chores to do I will turn on some peppy music to help the work get done faster. The stereo is in our room that has been dubbed "the pool table room", oddly enough because there is a pool table in it. The kids run around the pool table and dance and do all sorts of tricks to the music. They like the song, "Boogie, Woogie Choo Choo Train".

They looked so cute on this day and were full of energy because it was Friday and the weekend was finally here! Fridays are the day that Avery and Rowdy get to wear their school shirt to show school spirit, so fun.

His shirt says it all...

...HEARTBREAKER! We were just out doing our thing, making the rounds outside. We got the mail, fed the cats, watched the fish in our pond, and I recorded a video on my cell phone of Bo on the big boy swing and sent it to Ron. But the reason Bodie is a little Heartbreaker is because I was sitting on the steps near our barn petting one of the cats and he sits next to me and scoots really close and says, "kiss, you?" and proceeds to plant a super sweet kiss that was slightly sticky from the snack he just ate on my cheek!

Feeling better...

I started to write this really long post yesterday about how I have been feeling really down lately...but after I typed it all out, I highlighted it and pushed backspace and deleted it all. I am feeling better today. Nothing has happened today to make it different but I have just set my mind on thinking positively and am praying and hoping for the best!

The blue skies and sunshine are helping a ton!