Nothing's Ever Easy!

After a great start to the day (good run, kids playing happily together, Caleb had a 2.5 hour morning nap!) we headed out after lunch to run some errands. We've settled into a new schedule now - Caleb is down to 2 naps (first one from about 9:30 - 11:30 or so, and then he goes down again after we pick up Josiah from school from 2:30 - 4:00). It's working out very well - it has helped with some of the nap issues we were having with Callie. She (and Jacob on the days that he takes a nap) goes down for her nap after we pick up Josiah as well. We were having all these issues because when I was trying to put her down at noon (so she could have a two hour nap and be awake by 2:15 to pick up Josiah), she wasn't tired. But I couldn't wait until 1 pm -she'd only get an hour nap and be a bear! This new schedule is working out great.

ANYWAYS - we headed out after Caleb got up to do some errands and none of them were quickies. Partially because I have 3 little ones with me and partially because they ALL involved some sort of return or price adjustment or receipt issue. I had 4 stops to go to - and we made it through all of them...but barely!

Stop #1: Walmart. Had to return some plastic eggs that I bought last week. I found the bag in the attic of 200 of them that I thought David had thrown out when we moved (it drives him nuts that I save them). Looked for plates/napkins for Callie's party but struck out.

Stop #2: Target. Got a $3.00 refund because I realized that I had forgotten to give them one of my coupons when I was there on Monday. Returned the first batch of plates/napkins that I got there. Found Easter-y ones that I wanted for Callie's party and bought those instead. Went out to the car, then realized I forgot to ask cashier for a rain check for the eggs that are on sale (99 cents for a dozen!). Put stuff in the car and went back inside with kids. Lady at customer service said I'd have to go over TO the eggs and bring her the sign because she needed a number. No thanks lady - I don't have time for that. I'll just send an email to corporate and complain about their LACK of customer service.

Stop #3: Walgreens. Getting some contact solution that David & I use that was on sale this week and some silly bands for the party this weekend. Kids were SO excited about these - and I was excited to find some Music ones! :) Also got some cream of....soup that was onsale & had a coupon for (made it 29 cents a can). Realized when I got out of the parking lot that they rang up at regular price (1.59) and not the sale price (0.79). SO mad...didn't want to obsess, but knew I had to make another stop to get it fixed.

Stop #4: Publix. Returning 2 boxes of baby cereal (don't like Beech Nut...only like Gerber). Needed to exchange 3 bottles of laundry detergent (I grabbed the regular ones instead of the ones with the "he" symbol on them. Don't want to screw up my lovely washing machine! Customer service gave me the money for the cereal and told me to bring the other detergents to her and she'd swap it out. Went to get my other few things and headed out the car. Put stuff in my trunk and realized I'd never gotten the detergent! Ran BACK inside with the kids and got the detergent and swapped it out at customer service. WHEW. I would have been so mad if I had gotten home and realized it!

Got back in the car and saw that I had 12 minutes before I was supposed to pick up Josiah. Decided to do Stop #5 even though I was going to be pushing it.

Stop #5: Walgreens. Again. Ran in with the kids and my cans of soup and he refunded me the difference in price and apologized for the mess-up. No biggie. Except that Caleb was starving his head off and screaming (which he NEVER does) with big tears rolling down his face, and Callie and Jacob were touching EVERYTHING in sight and driving me nuts.

Sigh. Run back in the car and race over to Josiah's school to collect him - 8 minutes late. thankfully he was still outside with the other few kids whose parents are slackers like me. Good grief. Nothing is ever easy! And I realized that the lady at Target did NOT give me my $0.05 credit for using a reusable bag...oh well. I'm not SO obsessive that I'm going to go in and ask for my nickel! :)

A good day though. Felt good to get all that accomplished, even as crazy as it was. I just ordered my blog books for 2007 and 2008, and am working on 2009 (it was SUCH a doozy of a year that I had to do it in two volumes!!!) :) Hooray!

Getting Ready!

Lots of getting ready around here this week. Getting ready for Callie's birthday (!!!!) on Friday, her party on Saturday, EASTER Sunday, then a quick trip up to see my Mom for a few days while we're on spring break, then a little (secret) camping trip that we're going to take the kids on next weekend. VERY exciting!!!!

Passover Seder

On Saturday night, we had the priviledge of going to another baptist church here in Lexington with two other families from our church. We went to see their Easter musical, entitled "The Passover" and then stayed for the Passover Seder. They had a messianic rabbi come lead everyone through it and it was an amazing experience. The boys both sat with us for the program, and then Jacob went to a children's class where they had a more simplified explanation of the Passover dinner. Josiah stayed with us to take part in it and we had an awesome time learning all about it. We enjoyed so much seeing what each of the elements represents and the meaning that it holds for each of us as Christians was amazing. Josiah loved it - talk about seeing the Old Testament come to life! It was a great evening!

Some great friends of ours - Hannah, Jenn and Tim
David & I with Josiah

Hannah was showing Josiah her mom's very cool (and tech savvy) phone. That's definitely the way to Josiah's heart - technological gadgets! :)

Nighttime Egg Hunt

On Friday night, we headed over to our church's recreational property (next to the land that's being cleared for our NEW location of the church!!!) for the nighttime egg hunt put on by our preschool ministry! We were so excited!! Never done a nighttime egg hunt before!!

It started off with a "diaper derby" - a race for the crawlers! Talk about hilarious! When we first started, Caleb and this other little girl were the only crawlers - and she was rather alarmed by the whole situation. Caleb took off crawling and thought it was great fun!
We figured he had it in the bag since the other "contestant" wasn't having anything to do with it....

....until Caleb noticed that everyone was looking at him and cracking up and cheering for him. Then he decided to stop and smile at everyone.

At about this time, the OTHER baby decided to crawl to her mom on the other side of the tarp and she won the race!!! Bummer!

Callie was trying to "help" Caleb along...

That's Jacob for you - just randomly grabs hold of Josiah for no other reason other than his hands were empty at the moment probably!

Callie getting ready for her "egg roll" race - with 3 of her favorite men behind her to cheer her on!

You like the shoes she picked to wear? They are LAST year's spring shoes...that are too small...but she refuses to give them up yet...and insists on wearing them outside all the time! Whatever!

Since I was holding Caleb, we "rented out" space in our stroller to our buddy bryant - who was tired but pacified with some potato chips! :)

Go Jacob go! He's off!!

Josiah (right in the middle of the middle of the pack) with some of the other 1st graders...getting ready for their "egg drop" (as in...don't drop it - these are REAL eggs...and not hard boiled either!) race.

I think I have this SAME exact picture from last Eater - Josiah carrying the spoon with the egg in it...and his other hand about 2 cm. away. That's my VERY careful son!

Happy brothers after a successful egg hunt! :)

They both got their quota of 20 eggs in probably 5.6 seconds flat - and were SO excited!

(I had Callie and Caleb over in another field for the preschoolers...sorry! no pictures of her hunting!)

Time to go home - tired kids, but what fun!! :)

A gorgeous spring day at the zoo!

You all know how much we love our zoo! Both Jacob and Callie have been asking to go back again, so we decided this weekend that Wednesday would be the day! After a gorgeous weekend, Monday & Tuesday were a bit cooler and rainy, so we got all of our "work" done on those days so we could play today! And play we did - we left after Caleb's morning nap and had a GREAT time together at the zoo!

We got to see the BRAND new baby giraffe - he was born during the snowstorm that we had last month. He was SOOOO cute!
This outfit that Callie's wearing is one that I got at the children's consignment sale last week. There was one in Virginia that I have gone to every year, twice a year, since Josiah was born! It was very sad to move away from it. But my friends here let me know about the big one here, so I finally got to check it out last week. Opening day was Friday, so I even was able to shop without any kids since David was home with them (double bonus!) I was mainly looking for Callie - Jacob & Caleb are set with hand-me-downs, but I had hardly anything for Callie for this spring/summer. I was able to get her lots of really cute outfits and feel much better about the season now. And the best part was when I came home with them, she was SOOO excited about her new "outfits". I'm telling you - girls are TOTALLY different than boys!! I was so thankful to have had success!! (We went to Old Navy on Saturday for Josiah and got him 3 new pairs of shorts and t-shirts, as well as new bathing suits for both boys...and since I had a 30% off coupon, I did pretty well!!)

You can tell my kids are being raised by a blogger - they kept jumping on these rocks and statues and saying "take my picture Mom!!"

We did see the REAL tiger today (he's not always out), and he was in rare form today. Prowling around his cage and GROWLING - for real! I've never heard a tiger roar in real life - it was very cool. We think it's because the monkeys on ape island were SO loud! :)

I love this boy.

Aside from the fact that Jacob makes Callie cry more than anyone else, he can be VERY loving too. I was sitting in front of them by the stroller, and he told Callie he had to hold her hand so she wouldn't fall out of the train. And so she did! I think she trusts him more than Josiah too (not sure why....but she does)!

Hey Mom! Guess what we found in the creek!!!

"A LOBSTER!!!!"

(I didn't have the heart to tell them it's not a lobster...I let David do that part...They were so excited!)

The Food Show

On Thursday after naps, we went to our first food show...and LOVED it!! I had gotten a flyer home from school a couple week ago inviting us to a food show at one of our district's high schools. They were bringing in all these vendors to offer tastes of their foods and were asking for people to come and sample them and fill out a survey. They were going to use this information to determine which vendors to go with next year and what foods would be on their menus.

So the kids and I headed over after naptime and boy was it fun! The whole cafeteria was just filled with tables of vendors and their food items. The kids' eyes got really wide when I told them they could taste anything - it was hilarious! There was some really good food too - some very unique things, and everything was quite good. It was nearing the end of the show so they were anxious to give us as much food as they can - the vendor from Tyson's actually sent me home with a whole pan of rotissiere chicken!! We brought home 2 containers full of food and samples and enjoyed an "hors d'oerve" dinner on the deck that night. I'll DEFINITELY be looking for that flyer again next year!! :)

THIS is why we bought the house with the smaller kitchen...

We really are so thankful. We still love our house, where our neighborhood is, and we are REALLY loving our backyard these days! It was a tough decision knowing I was getting a smaller kitchen than some of the other houses we looked at, but it is SO worth it these days!

When we moved in last year, we had a baby shortly there after and then it was August and SO super hot...so we are so enjoying springtime here! We are eating as many meals as possible out on our deck, and the kids are constantly wanting to be outside - makes for happy kids AND happy mommy!

The kids absolutely LOVE exploring out there - down by the little creek, in and out of the trees - they just are happy happy happy! And Callie just follows Jacob around - convinced that she is a vital part to whatever it is that he's doing!
This is the NOT so fun part....I bagged up all these myself one afternoon and it was only the beginning. We're hoping to get the beds cleared out this weekend (maybe) - if we're going to be out there this much over the next 6-8 months, I want it looking nice! :)

I piled up these sticks that had fallen off trees and Jacob and Callie thought it was hilarious. It was a campfire for a while, and then Jacob decided it would be a good beaver home. A few minutes later he said "no beavers are going to live here - there's no door!"

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

After a quiet start to the week - VERY intentional - we did take some time to celebrate St. Patrick's Day...at least a little bit! :)

Green milk (Jacob is being dramatic....he asked for green milk for DAYS after this)
Spinach fettucini alfredo for lunch...

This is what Josiah brought home from school...

"I feel lucky because I am the fastest boy in the class! And I have a X-box and a family to live with."

I guess I should be glad that I made it on the clover...and not focus on the fact that he thought of our old, archaic X-Box first! :)

All good things must come to an end....

We finally left West Palm Beach a little after 3pm. A wee bit later than we planned, but it worked out just fine. The kids all took 2 1/2 hour naps in the car and woke up just as we were stopping for dinner! We stopped (as always) at a place with a playground, and Caleb got to enjoy playing at his first indoor playarea - it was a BIG hit with him! :)
The drive home went smoothly - kids did great, slept well, and David and I had fun talking through all the events of the weekend and all the different moments of the wedding. It was such a wonderful weekend - such a special time for Kristen and Chris - and we were so thrilled to be a part of it!!

Sailing Away!

Sunday morning was time change Sunday!!!! The GOOD thing about that was that we didn't have to be up anywhere early (like we do every OTHER Sunday of of our lives....), so we really did sleep in! Caleb was the first one up at 8:30 am, and Callie slept until 9:30 am!!! It was great - nice and leisurely!!

David was the only one that was up at the crack of dawn. He got up at 6 am to meet Scott down at the docks! You see, Scott decided to buy a sailboat 2 weeks ago (well, he got Kelli to agree to it 2 weeks ago and a few days later, there was a sailboat at their house!!), so he's been DYING to get out on it. But there was this little derailment in his plans called a WEDDING that was going on in the midst of it, so he had to be patient. David was happy to go out with him and be part of his merriment - Scott was SO excited! The kids and I meanwhile had breakfast, got our stuff loaded in the car, checked out of the hotel, and headed to Kelli's for a quiet morning.

We had decided we weren't going to rush out and leave early. We wanted to have a leisurely morning, spend some time with the family, and then leave around 2 pm. It was nice having some down time finally!

Josiah worked on a little bit of his homework, and was happy to show Tutu and Kelli all that he is learning.
Jacob crawled around outside in the backyard finding slugs and lizards.

And then, we got THE CALL!!! That the boat was in the water (you see, Scott doesn't know how to sail yet...minor detail) and they were heading towards the docks at the end of Scott & Kelli's street. So off we headed to go see the sailors!!

And there they were!! (They couldn't get the sails up, but used the motor instead....) It was SO fun to see their boat (named pi...like the math sign - David loved it - and it was 3/14 - which is the equivalent of pi!!! ).

The kids were trying to wait patiently for them to dock so they could get on and try it out too!

David was doing "the Titanic" pose on the front - it was hilarious!

Finally getting it docked...

Scott took David Oates (their family went to church that morning and he was still in his church clothes!), Luke and John out for a bit.

Then we all realized that this "quick" little outing was going to take much longer. So much for leaving at 2 pm!! We realized that we should have put our kids on first since we had to head out, but it worked out okay.

Caleb was SO happy to see Daddy - he'd been gone all morning out to sea! :)

Our kids were excited to get to ride - they haven't been on a boat since going out with our friends (the water RATZ!!!) in VA Beach, so it was so fun for them to get to go out again.

Scott was a great captain!

Their boat even has this little cabin so they could totally "camp" out - sleep there and everything! (Not my cup of tea, but THEY could!) :)

Ahoy mates!!