What a week!!!

Warning, this one's kinda long. I'm sure all of you have had these weeks, probably more are like this than not, they typically are in my house, however this one was cram packed. Translation... way too busy, but loads of fun and work. I've been dying to hit the keyboard and post, however there wasn't any time for it. So you say, what was so crazy, let me tell you in a nutshell...... The week started with my oldest daughter sick all day Sunday and part of Monday, which meant mommy was primarily housebound and we needed groceries in the worst way. So we cleaned house, hubby worked at a second job and then went to a friends for dinner and Monday night football. Hubby was home all week, which is always pleasant, however he was sick half the time due to an allergy to sheetrock and the fix-it-all husband of mine decided to drill a hole in a wall to run some wiring for some family and whalla.... instant illness. He also had many, many at-home tasks to complete and mother nature wasn't working in our favor regarding some of his outdoor duties, so he was working like crazy trying to complete his hunny-do-list between periods of slight rain and my availability. My car is finally in the shop getting the a/c fixed amongst other needed minor fixers, and I am exhilirated about driving a car with working windows, a/c, and speedometer. I had a crazy busy schedule at work, the kind when you don't have time to take a bathroom break, and to top it off we had extra meetings, and then take a crazy whole family trip to Wally world and buy groceries. Dakota had a different week at school, we had a parent teacher conference 7:30 Tuesday morning, and it was homecoming week, which made for a crazy week of no dress code and themed dressing days.



Dakota dressed in her Wacky Wednesday get up (I think the tights made the outfit!)

She loved wacky Wednesday. After a full day Thursday of school and work, and teaching a gym class at Dakota's school, then completing our parent partner hours of picking up trash, watering and weeding, we ran home, cleaned up and went to the Lazaro's for Blakey's 6th birthday.

Levi grinning at Blakey's party "When do I get cake?"

Mouths too full for smiles
Levi with Kindle's best friend Ethan (and Blakey's new motorcycle)
I think the big girls thought they were too big to party like the little ones
Patiently waiting her piece with friends
Ready to watch Blake open presents

During our stay, Kindle chipped her tooth on the trampoline and Blakey's cousin broke her arm. Daddy wasn't able to celebrate with us because he had a double header with his softball team. Then we woke up early on Friday to rush to court and evict our no paying tenant, which I am glad to state, we won! She's out in 5 days. Then we took our lovely kiddos to eat ice-cream as a reward for Dakota's wonderful grades, I'm happy to state her progress report shows three 100's and two 99's, and the rest are all E's for excellent. She is blessed with knowledge. Levi also had his first day at school with no corrections! We are very excited. He currently has to walk with his class on the chain gang rope and a child leash, but he's not running away from the class anymore and his teachers are thrilled. Kindle was rewarded for always staying on green during her classtime, which means she always behaves. Then we rushed down to get new tires on my car, it really, really needed some, and leave it at the shop. Finally we stopped and visited with Chad's parents for a minute and spent the rest of the evening with friends playing games, haven't done that in a long while. Early Saturday morning, the hubby's went fishing and the kiddos and I began to clean house and I got my volunteer info ready for church. All of this happened in one exhausting week. Sunday has been a wonderful Sabbath, watching football, playing with the kids, and visiting my sister and her family for dinner. I have loved every minute of it, but I am praying for a little less business this week and some more quiet time with our Maker. Food for thought.... Did you know less than 10% of Christian families have any type of faith discussion at home? This was shocking news to me. Please spend intentional time with your kids, they are the most precious gifts you will ever receive and it is our jobs as parents to train them up in the ways of the Lord. Just speaking plainly.

What'd she say?

Yes, that seems to be the instant response around here to our wonderfully, preciously made middle child. Kindle can be as sweet as pie, rough as nails and everything in between. She has her own sense of humor, a keen sense of observation and a little mouth that believes she needs to spit it all at you, whether you are ready for it or not. Just a couple of examples for those of you who haven't heard her "latest Kindle moments". Her class recently learned about poison control at school, and the similarities between possible poisons and everyday items such as candy. Fast forward to dinner, when asked to please eat some of her black beans, she kindly replied in her most sweet, girly voice, "but I think they are poison", at which time daddy nearly choked on his food. After dinner, while daddy was playing "daddy beat down" with all three kids, he politely asked her to stop picking and eating her boogies (I know, totally disgusting) and she replied once again in her very sweet, innocent voice, "but I like the juicy ones". I really thought I was going to hurl at that one, and so did her dad who became speechless at her comment. Several months ago, while my sister was leaving our house and I was helping her to her car, Kindle began screaming our dog's name at the top of her lungs while hanging out our doorway. Our dog was completely ignoring her, which increased her volume even more. I thought she would give up and go inside, I should have known better. After several minutes I requested that she stop yelling the dog's name at which time she closed her lips and without a second thought or hesitation, she vocalized through her pursed lips, as loudly as she could, her attempt at our dog's name, with a closed mouth. I stood dumbfounded, and my sister began laughing hysterically. What is a parent to do? A couple weeks ago, I babysat for some friends of ours, and their third son, who is almost two, came into the house and began talking. Well, until this point, my kiddos hadn't heard him speak anything that they understood other than mommy and daddy. Kindle was ecstatic that he could speak and she said "mommy look, he can talk, and he speaks Spanish". I guess she didn't quite understand him still. A while back, Kindle and Levi began arguing, and I was in another room, which I knew was going to lead to someone crying and then "Mommy!!!!", which it did, however I wasn't prepared for Kindle to run into the room and tell me that Levi had hit her in her heart, where Jesus lives, and without stopping she turned to Levi and shouted "You hit Jesus!". I immediately turned my head so the kids wouldn't see me choking down the laughter so mommy could handle the heated battle. And just today, a close friend of mine took my sweet Kindle home with her so mommy could do some more work, and while visiting with them, their middle son stated that he was a boy "because, because, because, ....." and she decided to finish his statement with "because you have a penis." And he agreed "yes I do" and she said "but I don't" and he said "nope". And then the two kids dropped the subject and began talking about something else. Oh my, daddy is going to have a field day with this one. She has also moved off of her songs that she sings constantly about whatever she sees, like "trees in the water, trees in the water, trees in the water, going up now, going back down now," to bible songs, or should I say two lines from a bible song that she sings over and over and over, all day and night long, like "oh no, you never let go, oh no, you never let go, oh no you never let go". Sometimes Bubba literally puts his hands over his ears when we are in the car. Daddy was very excited to hear that she has just recently learned the next few lines of "oh no, you never let go, through the calm and through the storm, with every high and every low, Lord you never let go of meeeeeee." So cute! And last but not least, everything she needs to intensify with an adjective is "soakin". For example, one would say "you are soakin' wet", but Kindle says "this is soakin' fun" or "I am soakin' cold." Everything is "soakin" these days. These are just a few of our little Kindle's moments. I'll post more soon.

Hair?

"Bubba" June 2008
My precious baby boy had the most beautiful red hair, until daddy decided he needed to be a "big boy" and took him to the nearest salon and literally chopped off all his adorable locks. And the worst part, mommy wasn't aware this was happening because I was at an inservice training seminar all day and daddy didn't even keep any of it for his baby book. All daddy said "I told you he needed a hair cut." The good news is that Levi thinks he is the coolest because he thinks he looks like a friend he completely admires, and everyone has told him how big and handsome he looks. I have finally adjusted to the new look, he's adorable either way, but I do miss those sweet, soft tufts of red curls. And just in case you are wondering, as soon as I saw him I told him he looked awesome with his new style, even though daddy recieved a few not so nice comments.

Bad Bad Blogger

I've been a bad, bad blogger. I'm guilty of getting on the site and checking on my friends and before you know it, it's time to help a kiddo, or cook, or I hear..."Oops, Mommy!!!!!", you get the picture. I absolutely love the whole blogger world and I am making a declaration to blog at least once a week (with pictures if appropriate). I think that's a reasonable goal. So check in often and read up on our hillarious happenings from our house. Let me be the first to tell you, it's never boring around here and my kids always give me plenty of blogging stories to share. Till then, God Bless!!!!!!