Pioneer Day

Today was Pioneer Day for Mikayla's grade at school. They dressed like pioneers, brought food that had been prepared from scratch and in containers that were not plastic...Mikayla was even going to have to write with her right hand today like they used to make the lefties!

All of the third graders dressed up for their fun day.

Can you tell which one is my girl?

Rolling out the dough for the Cinnamon buns.

Easter 2009

A few photos from Easter. ..

Walking to church...

Maddie and Daddy

Looking beautiful (and handsome).

Three weeks till we meet baby #5!!

Teeny fingers trying to get into a foil egg. He worked at this for a looong time. So cute!

Chocolate overload! We let the kids eat as much as they had...they each got about 8 plastic eggs full so it wasn't too unreasonable...oh- and that huge egg Maddie is mowing down on. EW, yikes, it was kind of a lot!!


So blessed to be in the same town with this fantastic family that we love so much. The kids have great times with their cousins, it's really sweet how close they are. I love having so many people that I trust to speak truth and love into our kid's hearts!



On the flip side, it is always SO SAD to be sooo far away from the rest of our lovely family and friends in the States at time like these!

Patient Appreciation Day

Here are some pictures from the Mexican themed Patient Appreciation Day. We put out a table of healthy snacks and the girls and I did a bit of decorating the night before.

Flowers Mike's Mom brought in...great coordinating with the theme Mom!

Beans and rice with cheese, tomato and some home made chips

A different thing; Jicama...with lime, cilantro and chili powder

This looked better in person. I blame it on the camera :) My girls helped for 2 hours to tape all the tissue paper rectangles on to the string!

Yum! Cinnamon apples!

Hairbows Have A Home!

Wanna see it? Click here ---->Hair Bow Blog!!

Mexican Inspiration

Tomorrow is Patient Appreciation Day at Mike's office. They chose "Mexican" for the theme. Here is my inspiration for the "decor"...I am sure pics of the event will follow. I seem to be back into blogging for now, must be that final month, knowing a baby in the belly allows more freedom than a baby out of the belly :)

Dancing Maddie

Today Maddie had her big dance recital. She was so excited. She got to perform in two costumes because she is in tap and ballet. The theme was "Barnyard" . She was a milk maid for ballet and a chick for tap. She had a smile from ear to ear the entire time. She clearly loved the spotlight!!








Yesterday, Mads and I made some treats for her show!!

If you want to see more, Click Here!!

Wedding Preparations...

My cousin Kathryn is getting married May 23 in California. I am a bridesmaid, Mikayla is a junior bridesmaid, Mailee and Maddie are the flower girls and Caleb is the ring bearer.

I am putting together a few of the little details for her...garter, pillow, etc. She sent me the jacket that goes with her dress and I have taken it apart to use the lace. It's so pretty!

Look at these fun colors I get to work with!!!

Thinking about Hairbows...

I have rekindled my love for making hair bows. I can't stop, really. There are piles in some stage of creation all over my house! I am dreaming about them in my sleep!

I guess it is partly because I know I have another little girl coming into our family... I see no end in sight for bow-wearing in my household!! I think it is also because it's such a fun creative outlet and I LOVE seeing them on little heads around town!!!

Today I am just contemplating my next step on the bow front. Packaging, new products, marketing... hmmm...lovely Friday thoughts!

polka dots never get old!!!!!!!

the new "sheer collection"

UM...can you stand it???

This is Caitlyn's first swimsuit...and her matching bow (I will need to make a headband or sun hat to attach the bow to because knowing my newborns, she will not have any hair:)

Bows for an upcoming wedding order!

The Boy and The Berry

Our little guy tried a new trick this weekend...shoving a berry up his nose! When he first came inside to inform us that he had a berry in his nose, we had no idea what he was trying to say got in his nose.."a bug?"..."a bone"...? He went back outside, got a berry and showed us! We looked and saw nothing. He said it felt like it was gone so we sent him back outside with a strict warning to never do that again.

When he came in from playing, he had a suspiciously berry-colored juice running out of his nose. Mike got the flashlight and took a closer look. Sure enough, lodged really far up in his nose was a little red berry!

Thankfully, this whole event happened at Mike's parent's house so we were not alone. I stood outside the room while Mike and his dad tried to convince Caleb that it was "okay" to let them stick sharp tweezers up his teeny nose. There was a lot of screaming (by the boy) and more coaxing, some reasoning, a few "where's mommy"'s and tons of tears. The men stayed calm and eventually, Mike was able to extract the foreign object from our son's nose! I immediately ran in the room to hold my exhausted little boy. He had spent so much energy wriggling around in his Grandpa's arms that he was dripping with sweat!

We were so thankful that the berry came out without a trip to the ER!!

Please excuse these out of focus photos...at least I documented the occasion, right?

The men assessing the situation and preparing for "minor surgery"...

...Caleb, not so thrilled with all the fuss over a little berry.

The extracted berry!

My tuckered out little Caleb. he fell asleep within 20 minutes of the berry removal!!

Cute kiddos!

We are blessed with 4 unique, precious, caring, smart, active, healthy children. I love how much they love each other. (most of the time :) Here's an updated photo.

If you click on the photo, you can see the rest of the pics from this fun day and more photos from March :)

Special Kitchen Time

The kids have been on Spring Break for two weeks. Although they eat a lot more and I have much less time to myself, I have quite enjoyed having my big girls at home and I have really enjoyed having no place to go...no rushing...no agenda!

The girls are so great at reading books to Maddie and Caleb, preparing snacks, playing outside...they just make everything more fun for the little ones. I will be a little sad to send them back to school on Monday!!

At the first of the year, we started the girls with an allowance. Along with that privilege, we created some expectations that are mandatory in our home. Keeping the rooms tidy and putting their coats on the hooks, well, we won't talk about how those simple tasks are going...BUT the dinner clean up has been going really well and I am thrilled with the difference it has made in our home! (and my workload :)

We started by dividing the chores; clearing table, washing dishes and drying dishes. They alternate every night. There was some whining but we muddled through it and they can do it without a peep now. It is so great to see them all working together in the kitchen!!

I felt so blessed by their help and encouraged by how much they can actually do that I decided to add a new responsibility...kitchen helper...every night, one of the girls is my "kitchen helper" and she stays in the kitchen with me from start to finish of the dinner preparation. The girls have all learned how to wash and cut and peel all different vegetables, boil eggs, flip, stir and poke different types of cooking dinner dishes, and how to get it all to the table. I thought this would be a learning experience for them but I have gained so much from having one on one time with them. They like to chat with me all by themselves and I have appreciated having special time to hear what they have to say and being available to give them my full attention. Why didn't I think of this sooner?

Over Spring Break, the "kitchen helper" job has morphed into an all day privilege. The girl of the day wants to help prepare snacks, lunches and bake a special treat. Here is the fruit of Mailee's "kitchen helper" labor...

Loving My Pandora

The kids and I took some photos today for fun. The subject: My Pandora bracelet.

Open it up Maddie, see what's inside...

"Mom's fancy bracelet!"

These Pandora bracelets are the new alternative to a charm bracelet...instead of charms, they have beads that can be added. I love it!

my beads:

-The three pink glass beads represent my 3 girls...the one with flowers is Mailee's, everyone agrees on this. The other two, well, the girls can't agree, they both like the swirly one!

- a little girl bead to represent my daughters

-a little boy bead to represent my son

-the bead in between the kid beads is emerald...my birthstone, from Mike for Christmas

-a house given to me by my mom when we moved into our home

-a rhino to represent Rhino Chiropractic (a symbol of taking charge of our health )

- "c" bead for Colleen and also Caleb...(and soon Caitlyn as well)

-a cake bead to represent my cake-making passion (new bead from Mom for Christmas...probably my favorite one :)

- 5 fun beads, just because my mom has good taste :) I guess i could choose one of those to represent each of my kids but they would probably argue about that too so maybe I'll just leave them un-titled!!

I also have these two, sometimes I rotate them on the bracelet...

-"m" bead for Michael, and Mikayla, and Mailee and Maddie

-blue glass bead to represent Caleb

This is such a fun collection! Moms, if you don't have one, I highly recommend you start hinting (wink wink)...it's a great thing the family can add to at special occasions!! my kids love looking at the beads and talking about them!