I'm getting there with this whole catching up business.
March 2013:
Colson finished up his science experiment. He built four types of bridges, then put weights on them to see which one could hold the most weight. In case you were wondering, it was the arch that could hold the most weight. Which is not the bridge shown above.
Jilly taught herself some new tricks. She fell out once, and now just likes to hang precariously on the edge. Her other trick is to get her legs stuck between the slats. And I mean stuck. I have had to use cooking spray on a few occasions to get her legs unstuck! I'm sure it doesn't help that her legs are so chubby. :)
The kids and I got to meet up with my cousin Nakole and her darling family at Red Robin. They were in town for a few days. It was lovely to see her and meet her kids. I hadn't seen her and her husband since our grandpa Gubler's funeral over 9 years ago. It had been way too long!
Our kids all had a blast getting to know each other!
We went with Vivi's teacher, Mr. Kennedy, and a few of her classmates to the fire station/police department to deliver some goodies.
Funny story. The firefighter in this picture and his crew are the ones that saved Jilly when she was a mere 7 weeks old. Story found here.
I read this fabulous book. I highly recommend it! I keep lists of the books I read by the year. I was looking at my list from last year and noticed I had only read 6 books. 6 books! The whole year!!! I used to read a book a week. (Although that was before having my third child. It's been a while!) It wasn't one of my better years for reading. Of course having 5 kids doesn't seem to leave much time for reading. And by the time I go to bed at night, I'm way too tired to be able to keep my eyes open long enough to read a few sentences. My goal this year is to at least read more books than I did last year. I'm setting the bar pretty high. Hopefully I can do it. ;)
This is my errand buddy. And this is a pretty accurate picture of what she usually looks like by the time we get done with our errands. Poor girl!
Trent went to Amsterdam, grew his hair out, and dyed it green. Just kidding. It's a wig if you couldn't tell.
He was only there a few days and most of that was spent in meetings, but his coworkers convinced him to go take a walk through the Red Light District with them.
During daylight I might add. When there was no craziness going on. His mom told him not to, but he just wouldn't listen. ;)
Trenton got his braces off! He was so excited! And a few days that, he cut his hair short. Between braces off, and a new haircut, he looked so grown up! Like he had aged another year or two in just a few days! And his voice is changing. Stop growing I say!
These two have been as goofy as ever. Preston got in the car one day after school and for some unknown reason was yelling out, "Pumpkin farts! Pumpkin farts!" To which Vivi responded, "When a pumpkin farts, does it smell like pumpkin pie?" Good question Viv.
We spent a day over at grandma and grandpa's a couple weeks after grandma Stock had her total knee surgery. Grandma said she was getting sick of herself and needed some company. We were happy to oblige. Vivi showed Jilly how to dress the Barbies and Jilly loved every minute of it.
And Preston and Vivi thought grandpa was their pony for the day.
I tried my darnedest to get caught up on our whole laundry situation. I was semi-successful. For about a day. Then it looked like this again. A friend of mine suggested starting a nudist colony. So, so tempting.
Jilly stole Trenton's dinner one night. And he let her. Cause he's an awesome big brother like that. No wonder she loves him so much. I'm pretty sure he would do anything for her.
Vivi acquired the nickname Fred. Cause Jilly used to call her friend. And it sounded kinda like Fred.
Trenton and I made an apple pie for him to take and share with his class for pi day. We made pumpkin too. His personal favorites.
A birthday text for Uncle Ryan. Cause we love him.
Easter Sunday. These are the dresses my mom made for them this Easter. She is one amazing seamstress!
We had Easter dinner with all the family the day before Easter. On Easter Sunday, we ended going over to my dear friend Michelle's house. And this is the only picture I have from either day.
Trent took another trip over to Atlanta to do some house hunting. He found a house that we loved! It was on two acres, there was a pool in the yard, a playground, it was completely updated, and my favorite part... it had a 5 car garage! We put an offer on it immediately. And so did 4 other people. Needless to say, we did not win that bidding war. So he took another trip a couple weeks later and found another house. But after getting the inspection done, and learning about all of the fire hazards going on in the basement (they finished it themselves) and finding out we would have to pretty much rip out the basement to fix it, we backed out of that deal. Then we found another house. The lot was amazing!!! To say the least. It was an acre and a half lot. It backed to a lake, had it's own dock, a playground and basketball hoop in the back yard, and huge, beautiful pine trees to shade it all. And the owners said they would leave us their paddle boat and fishing boat. We pretty much were buying the house for the lot. Because the house itself was less than fabulous. First of all, it was small. But with the beautiful yard, I was willing to look past that. Second of all, the house was pink. The whole thing, inside and out. Carpet, blinds, tile, you name it. All in various shades of pink from fuchsia to baby pink. I was willing to look past that too. It wasn't anything a little paint, new flooring, and some elbow grease couldn't fix. But then we got down to the nitty grittiness of the situation. It needed all new pipes, we would have to add a bathroom to the basement, and it needed all new siding. That added to all of the other work we were going to have to do, the house was proving to be a money pit. But the yard! We were blinded to the house at first because we loved the yard so much. It was that nice! But after thinking it through, we backed out of that deal too. And pushed our move date back another month. And increased our level of anxiety. Oh well... such is life.
Trent took another trip over to Atlanta to do some house hunting. He found a house that we loved! It was on two acres, there was a pool in the yard, a playground, it was completely updated, and my favorite part... it had a 5 car garage! We put an offer on it immediately. And so did 4 other people. Needless to say, we did not win that bidding war. So he took another trip a couple weeks later and found another house. But after getting the inspection done, and learning about all of the fire hazards going on in the basement (they finished it themselves) and finding out we would have to pretty much rip out the basement to fix it, we backed out of that deal. Then we found another house. The lot was amazing!!! To say the least. It was an acre and a half lot. It backed to a lake, had it's own dock, a playground and basketball hoop in the back yard, and huge, beautiful pine trees to shade it all. And the owners said they would leave us their paddle boat and fishing boat. We pretty much were buying the house for the lot. Because the house itself was less than fabulous. First of all, it was small. But with the beautiful yard, I was willing to look past that. Second of all, the house was pink. The whole thing, inside and out. Carpet, blinds, tile, you name it. All in various shades of pink from fuchsia to baby pink. I was willing to look past that too. It wasn't anything a little paint, new flooring, and some elbow grease couldn't fix. But then we got down to the nitty grittiness of the situation. It needed all new pipes, we would have to add a bathroom to the basement, and it needed all new siding. That added to all of the other work we were going to have to do, the house was proving to be a money pit. But the yard! We were blinded to the house at first because we loved the yard so much. It was that nice! But after thinking it through, we backed out of that deal too. And pushed our move date back another month. And increased our level of anxiety. Oh well... such is life.
