Comfort food...

Nothing like a little icecream dripping out the sides of your kids mouth to make their day...:)

Chris turns 41...

For a guy that's turning 41, I gotta say, he looks pretty happy to me. Maybe it's the fact that there's only 18 candles on his b-day cake...could he feel 18? Or maybe the fact that he's holding a baby bottle...could he feel like a baby? Either way, Happy Birthday to my awesome Chris. You're the best.

My little Letty...

I ran across this picture of little Scarlett last night. I had to look closely to even know whether it was Grace or Scarlett. I just couldn't believe how much my baby had grown this past year. All that curly hair really changes a kids appearance! As I chomp down chocolate chip cookies as a write this I can't help but be happy that I had 6 kids. They grow up so fast. If I had only had one or two I think for me personally I would be crying my eyes out because in the blink of an eye they grow up. I know, I know...a million little old ladies tried to tell me this, but you never really realize it until you see it with your own eyes.

To My Mom...

Recently I decided I wanted to buy an extra special Mother's day gift for my Mom. I'm usually terrible at getting my Mom something on Mother's Day and I felt this year needed to be different. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, life is too short to not show love to those we do love. And that especially includes myself because sometimes (often times) I forget. I found a website called The Vintage Pearl and found just what I was looking for. A bracelet with 5 different charms...signifying the 5 children my Mother raised. The gift came much earlier than expected. My parents decided to come for a spur of the moment visit this past weekend and of course the kids were begging me to give her the bracelet now, instead of Mothers Day. I too couldn't hold out, so we sat her down and gave her this bracelet. She loved it. I didn't realize how much she would, but it made me so happy that I chose it for her. She is such a special Mother who is too hard on herself and forgets far too often what a great mom she was. She focuses on her mistakes rather than her successes. She forgets that all Mother's everywhere (I don't care who you are) all make mistakes...more often than we realize. That doesn't make us bad Mother's, that makes us human. The point is, she did the best she could, and I think that is pretty darn great. I love you mom!

Sorry for the damage....

One thing my parents taught me by example was the importance of "Date Night" with your spouse. My parents never, ever, ever missed a Friday night to go out, away from kids and eat and reconnect. Chris and I have been consistent about it the last few years and we cherish our night away together. I was on Facebook the other day and read a status update by my brother David...who is hilarious by the way. It said "Try this for fun: Go to a parking lot and get sticky notes and put them on peoples cars saying "sorry for the damage." Watching them is priceless." Soooooo, on my date with Chris Friday we decided to try it. We never do anything like this and thought, why not??? So we drive to the Rite aid parking lot and see this 30ish year old guy pull up in a pickup truck. Chris gets out and quickly puts the sticker on his car door. We sat about 10 minutes waiting for him to come out. When he did, he looked at the note, paused, then circled the car several times examining it for at least 3 or 4 minutes looking completely perplexed, all the while Chris and I are laughing our mean little hearts out. We did it a few more times and I gotta tell you...my brother was right....priceless. I'm happy Chris and I can have fun together despite the fact that we've been married 14 years. The fun never ends in this family.

In the words of Ke$ha "I like your beard."

Chris keeps saying things like "I'm losing all my hair and I look like a big dork." Or, "You're hot and I'm not." He's always said stuff like that, but I think he thinks that aging totally sucks and he's trying to fight it and make it disappear. I'm 8 years younger than him and I feel the same way, so I totally get why he isn't too excited about aging. I wish he knew though that I'm more attracted to him now then I have ever been. We played the Newlywed game at game night with a bunch of friends the other night and we were asked what we're most attracted to in our spouse. I said his eyes, and then a friend of mine reminded me how much I'm in love with his beard and I had to agree. His beard is totally hot and if he shaves it I will crawl in a hole and die. I love facial hair...it's totally hot and wonderful. He's hot and wonderful, and on the 21st of this month he will have been mine for 14 years. I love this man. Oh, and can you guess what he was most attracted to in me?? My rear end....I know, romantic, right?

Another one bites the dust...

So, Chris has been running 3 days a week with the kids the past few weeks, and I talked all of them into doing a race. Chris, Austin and Connor ran the 3k, which is just under two miles. They were a little nervous, but I was so proud of them for getting out there and accomplishing this goal! Connor came in 2ND for his age group and Austin in 3rd. Chris hasn't been running that long either and ran the whole way with no walking. He rocked. I did the 10k, and as usual I had lots of anxiety going into it. I always have a knot in my stomach before a race. Everyone looks so much faster then me (as if what someone looks like determines their speed.) I was smarter this time, I took it a little slower the first 1/2 of the race, then I picked up speed the last half. This strategy seemed to help, especially in terms of how I felt. It's the first race I have done where I didn't come away wanting to die. I finished 3rd in my age group with a time of 8:38 per mile. I am not normally a fast runner, and let me tell ya, I'm going to enjoy this, because it will likely never happen again. Yay for goals, and accomplishing them.

Remembering who I am and being happy about it...

I am a mom 24/7. This is a wonderful thing! It's the most important aspect of my life and always will be no matter what. It also requires that I re coupe, center myself and get away once in a while to remind myself that I am not just a mother and wife, but also a friend, a woman, and an individual person with individual interests. My mom tells me regularly that the one thing she regrets about motherhood is that she got lost in it. She never gave to herself. I don't want to make the same mistake. Luckily I have a husband who fully supports me and welcomes the chance for me to grow and find who I am so that when our kids are all grown up I don't have to figure it out then. Boy, he's pretty awesome. So, I went with a group of awesome girls to Portland for two nights this past weekend. It was a weekend full of laughter (to the point of tears) to eating out all the time (which I happen to love to eat.) to getting locked out of our car at midnight in the Walmart parking lot (don't ask) to getting fake (yes FAKE) tattoo's just to say we did it. Ahhh....too many memories to name. When I came home, my husband loved me more, my kids loved me more, and I loved me more....oh and I definitely loved them more too.

What are we doing?

I know...I have been horrible about keeping up to date about what we have been doing, mainly because we haven't done much of anything! I admit we had some withdrawal after we went to Hawaii. We all felt sort of sad to have such bitterly cold weather, and the rain hasn't helped. Now that it's March though, I am excited for what kinds of blossoms are in store for us! We have experienced all the seasons in our new home except Spring, and I have a feeling there are going to be so many beautiful blossoms and flowers.

The kids had Spirit week at school a few weeks back and Austin won in his class. He tried sooooo hard and I have to admit he looked ridiculous, so I was excited it all payed off!

Even though we don't have much going on, life in our house never slows down. It really never ever does. There isn't time to get bored or whiny (though all of us do once in a while around here) but it does no good. Here are a few photo's of our life the last few weeks.