Julian and Lucy doing homework

Julian has moments when he just can't help aggravating Lucy - chasing her around, pulling her tail or ears, and even trying to ride her! (poor Lucy). But then there are moments when he is calm and they are the best of friends...

Some pictures ...

From last night...


Ok, just a cute picture, but the story behind it: Julian, Evan and Kathryn were playing pretend - Julian is 23 in this picture, Evan was 20 (but he was in Julian's room) and Kathryn was 1 month old, so she couldn't walk - of course. That's why Julian is carrying her. Every couple of minutes, he would come out and announce it was 10 years later - he was now 33, Evan was 30 and Kathryn was 10, and on and on. Until he was 103, Evan was 100 and Kathryn was 80. They came out walking on canes (made of Lincoln Logs taped together!).

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From this morning when we finally got the lighting worked out on the tree and the kids were putting on their ornaments. We were so glad Evan was able to join us this year - he had plenty of ornaments to put on too.

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After the tree was done - playing in Julian's room before our lunch date with Jason's high school friend...

(As you can see, Kathryn was much more excited to have her arm around Evan than he was!)

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And just because they wanted their picture with the tree....

Kathryn and her Daddy

Kathryn looked really cute this morning when she was ready for school. Julian is home again (and was still sleeping), so Jason got to take her. I actually asked Kathryn if she wanted to stay home today (I mean, come on, she is in preschool), but she really wanted to ride in the truck with Daddy and show her Daddy to her teachers and friends at school.

When I asked Kathryn if I could take her picture, she told Jason to get in the picture to so it would be prettier - she loves her Daddy.

Free Rice??

I saw this on Andy’s blog:

Free Rice

Supposedly, by guessing vocabulary, you give rice to hungry people??? I don't know, it sounds a little hard to believe, but I had some time to kill!

It is a little addictive. I stopped at 2000 grains of rice and my highest level was 40, although most of the time I stayed at 36-37... See how you do...

Home from school

Julian is home sick from school. We went to the doctor yesterday, and they said he has a virus - close to the flu, but not actually the flu bug - parainfluenza. Poor thing. The expert opinion is that he is very contagious and needs to stay home. Unfortunately, this means I could not go with Kathryn and her class to see "Nemo on Ice" today. Julian slept until 8:30 this morning, which I think might be a record. I can't remember another time when he slept that late. Anyway, the upside is he gets to eat in front of the TV instead of at the table. I recorded Shrek the Halls last night, which he is watching in this picture. He really liked it. Next was How the Grinch Stole Christmas, which somehow he has not yet seen! He ran and grabbed his book of it and compared the pages of the book to the movie. So smart! I guess it's important to learn early on that the movie is never as good as the book.

Lucy is also a big fan of the kids eating in the living room. Pan out and you see she is just waiting for him to drop something, although she is careful to not actually make eye contact. She avoids eye contact at all costs - scared she will be told to "go lay down", which is what happens normally when we are eating. Pet peeve - staring pets while I'm eating!

She is sweet though. Even here - I was on the floor beside her calling her name - I could not get her to look at me while Julian was eating! So funny.

New pink sweater ...

I just wanted to show off the new pink sweater Kathryn got this weekend from her Aunt Emily. She LOVES it and actually is wearing it again today. The hood is definitely a hit. Thanks Emily!

Thanksgiving weekend

We started the holiday with dinner at Jason's grandma's house. As always we had a good time sitting around talking, catching up. Julian and his cousin Samuel had a really good time together and they let Kathryn play along, although she had a good time with Kaitlyn too.

Kathryn is really the only one that will stand still when I ask her to, so I can get her picture.
All weekend, both of my kids ate ice. I don't know what started it, but anytime you saw either of them, they had a cup and a piece of ice in their hand licking it. Kinda weird...

There was a small battle going on between Samuel and Julian - Samuel was watching a football game of some kind and Julian wanted to watch Discovery channel.
Kaitlyn and Kathryn. They are both beautiful girls.

Friday we traveled to my parents' house to stay for a couple of days. We are normally so rushed to get from one place to another, and it was really nice to go and just hang out and not worry about what would happen next.

One thing that my kids love about Pappy and Nana's house is the stuff they get to eat and drink. There seems to be an unlimited supply of peanuts, barbecue potato chips and Coke (Nana does work for Coke, after all!). And Pappy is so much fun - he throws them in the air and swings them around and all the stuff we just don't do because they are SO heavy! :)

On Saturday evening, Uncle Randy had a great idea - to take Julian with him to his house to grab some stuff they needed. Well, what he didn't figure in was what to do with Kathryn, and it was a big to-do to figure something out so no one would be left out. What was decided in the end was that Julian and Randy would go for a walk and Kathryn would go to Randy's house to pet his dog. This is Kathryn waiting for Randy to get back from his walk with Julian - she was ready to go with coat and shoes on - but she was exhausted and was asleep within 5 minutes of sitting with Pappy.

This is what we did a lot of the time we were there - sitting in the den and talking. We did play some Scattegories Saturday night, but I didn't get any pictures of that. My niece Emileigh was REALLY good at it though, although none of us were as good as Pappy.

Ok, so the rest of my pictures were of our newest addition to the family, Vivian (Vivy).

Kathryn could not wait to get her hands on the baby. This is the first time holding her. When Randy and Emily first came over Friday night, Kathryn let everyone know she was Vivian's big sister. She told us she is a good big sister to Vivian. Poor thing - Vivian (and other soon to be cousins) are the closest she'll get to being a big sister. She will be an excellent big COUSIN!

Vivian seems to be going through some sort of growth spurt this week, and she spent a lot of time in feedings. Most of the time she nurses, so there was a little battle for who got to give her a bottle. Of course Pappy won, although aunt Ronda did get to give some of the bottle. Isn't she adorable?! She has such a pretty little face.

In this picture, I was holding Vivy and somehow scared her when I raised my arm to do something...I can't figure how exactly I did it, but it really scared her, and she wouldn't stop crying. I couldn't find her pacifier, so I just walked with her for a minute, and she just kept looking at me - probably realizing I was definitely not her Mommy. Even fussy and crying, she was adorable! Of course her Mommy came and fixed everything quickly enough - mommies can do that like no one else can.

These are some pictures Julian took:

Skittles

Sebastian (Sabby), who I think Sherri said is 17 this year.

And of course Lucy.

And this is how we ended the weekend. When we got home yesterday, after we had unpacked and relaxed for a few minutes, both kids came to sit with me and ended up falling asleep. Kathryn went first, and I think her snoring had some sort of hypnotizing effect on Julian, and he went shortly after; his snoring was almost as loud as hers.

I ELF-ed my family

I swore I would never do one of these, but....

Our ELF family

My TERRIFIC kids

This morning, Julian and Kathryn were both recognized at their school's monthly assembly. Kathryn was the PreK "Terrific Kid" for November. Julian got straight A's on his report card. What great kids we've got!

Colors of Fall - Illustrated

So, every year when the leaves start changing, I drive around town seeing the beauty of creation, and think about the verse I posted below - that God made Himself known to everyone through His creation...We are without excuse - we know SOMEONE created what has been created and only the fool says there is no God (Psalm 14:1).

Anyway, I made a point this year to actually capture some of this beauty on film...unfortunately, I waited too long for a couple of the trees I really wanted to get, but these are my favorite colors of fall - those beautiful colors that look like they are glowing when the sun hits them.

Romans 1:19-20

Because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.

Sleepover

Evan came to stay with us this weekend - just one night, but boy what a night!

As always, they went straight to Julian's room and attacked his toys - trains and tracks are always the favorite. I love seeing their creativity - you should hear the stories they come up with and act out with Thomas trains! I am starting to not mind the mess as much - as long as they keep it in the kids' rooms - since they are the ones to clean it up anyway! That is definitely a good thing about them growing up.

I really have no idea what they are doing in these pictures. In the first one, I tried to sneak up on them to take a candid shot, since as soon as they see the camera, they either start with just making faces or doing some weird dance while making faces.

This picture came out blurry, but I was scared to leave the light on to take another...I definitely did not want to wake them up and have to get anyone to sleep again!

Fun outside

We have experimented lately with letting the kids go outside to play by themselves (no adult supervision). It is scary and has really been a leap of faith on my part. I know it sounds silly - I was playing by myself outside when I was much younger - but when they are together playing, they just have no interest in behaving, it is just too much fun to be bad! Not to mention the absolutely terrifying stories you hear on the news about children being hurt or taken. Anyway, they love their new sense of freedom, and have really enjoyed playing with these "bike" toys, which they outgrew a while ago. They take them to the top of the "little hill" and roll down. The little daredevils especially like playing bumper cars, of a sort, and crashing into each other as they get to the bottom. Lucy loves it too, and goes for their feet as they roll. Of course I peek from the dining room to be sure they are still there and not bleeding or limping every few minutes (I'm afraid it is too much of a leap for me to leave them completely to themselves for that long!)

The drought has really reaked havoc on our lawn - what little grass we had is absolutely gone and now even the weeds - our mainstay for greenage in the backyard - are dying. I don't know if it is the recent frosts or no water, but I am already looking forward to the spring and new growth.

Field Trip

Kathryn went on her very first field trip today. I'm so glad I was able to go with her. As it turns out, I made a lot of new friends today - her classmates loved me! At one point, there were several little hands fighting over who got to hold my hand. Very nice :)



We went to a farm pretty close to where we live - it only took us about 20 minutes to get there. The kids got to ride a horse (wearing helmets!). It was a very slow ride in a circle, but every child there seemed to love it. After the horse ride, we went on a nature "hike" through the woods. There was a path (you could barely call it a path, really), which was pretty treacherous for a group of 4 year olds. In the middle of the woods, the owner of the farm read a story about trees and had them look around at all the trees (at this point, we were far enough in that all you could see was trees). After the hike, they played some games, which were kind of a flop, but some of the kids liked them. They made a craft (a scarecrow out of a paper bag), ate lunch, then made a real scarecrow. That was the most fun, I think. We broke up into teams - boys and girls and made a pretty funny-looking scarecrow. That took all of 5 minutes, and they spent the rest of the time we were there rolling in the left over hay and throwing it at each other.

Halloween

This was the first year we have actually gone door to door Trick-or-Treating. We have finally gotten comfortable enough with a few of our neighbors to let the kids go to their doors. For many reasons, we decided not to go to the Halloween event at church this year. Obviously, Julian is Spiderman and Kathryn, according to Kathryn is a "fairy godmother princess".



I was surprised at how few people had their lights on for Trick or Treaters. I think we went to maybe 4 doors within 1/2 mile of our house. Times have sure changed. It's a sad commentary on our world that people are either too scared to open their doors for strangers or think a child in a costume is evil in some way.

No one seems to mind the actual religious holidays being taken over by a big bunny or a fat man in a suit, but a holiday that has nothing to do with Christ - just a night for kids to have fun dressing up and asking or treats - that is boycotted! Seems strange to me. The most sacred holidays of Christianity - the celebration of Jesus' birth at Christmas and the celebration of His resurrection at Easter - those are the ones we should take seriously - get rid of the Easter Bunny and Santa! Don't do away with Halloween....