today -

i never made our bed ... rex every now & then really likes an unmade bed, its 'lived in' he says.

the crock pot was used for the first time .... in a long time!

i'm pretty sure i sounded like charlie brown's teacher to my 3rd grader .... 'waaa waaa waaa'

we went to our towns veterans day parade.

i forgot to call amie.

it rained.

ben, bustin' his moves to the local high school marching band's version of the battle hymn of the republic.

more great moves.

 : )

i just have this need to clarify - it was his idea to tuck his shirt in like that .... it not look i usually promote : )

 
- - -

and today, molly invited the guys to a tea party with pretend tea cups & real chocolate chips. where rex spoke with his best british accent & told them how to hold their pinkies out : )

happy weekend.

 

so i have yet to cave & join pinterest yet .... but i do confess to creating an instagram account this week : )

rex says of all the things he uses his phone for taking pictures is not one of them. i say, well .... i use my phone for pictures! never to be replaced with a real camera .... but there are times when its just convenient.

so, done.done.done. a whole post of phone pictures : ) which i will start by saying come mostly from the park where molly & regan would be pushed for hours in the swings if given the chance. 

as proof - park picture number 1.

#2 : )

a pink mary kay cadillac - this was sent to a friend, who has not quite sold enough product for this beauty!

more swings.

again swings ....

this was sent in a text to rex on a monumental school day .... the very first time benny wrote his name with a pencil on paper.

swings, again.

here she has a look of this is fun/i'm totally freaked out : ) for her, the thrill is worth the few seconds of i might actually fall out of this thing feeling.

i pretty much don't like budgets, at all. so much in fact that i rarely use one : ) however this week $40 bucks was all that was going to be given to target. and on top of that it went for boring stuff ... like wax paper, clorox, plain white napkins, q-tips, trash bags & the like. this was proof to rex that household items were indeed the only things purchased that day and!!! for less than $40.  i was nicely proud of myself for not buying the darling $12 on sale dresses i saw for the girls ....

his hair ....

i can hardly stand the thought of taking him to the barber for fear we'll leave with a bad hair cut for the holidays - however the kid does need to be able to see : )

this just looked fun to buy ....

and last, she ran a whole mile today like this - barefoot with her arms by her sides. regan & i were on the bike behind her cheering away.

- - -

next time we'll go back to regular pictures minus instagram : )

my favorite picture from today ~

- - -

- - -

it's raining & windy tonight. really raining. rex has the window open & the little space heater going.  he says sometimes it's ok to have the best of both worlds : )

happy day light savings night ... or maybe it's the end of day light savings??  rex likes when we spring forward best. i (except the fact of the kids waking up an hour earlier!) like this night best when i can look at the clock and read 9:37 and then go ..... but really its only 8:37.

i just told him i'd like a new app for my phone .... he has tried to teach me how to get them .... but i just like telling him what i'd like and having him do it for me. so it's loading right now. i still pretty much use a phone for calling people & texting : )

but speaking of modern technology, all over facebook tonight are albums popping up from today's trip to san francisco.  so we'll keep up this way & post about it ... all fresh off the experience. we went on our first official school field trip today. not like hey lets ditch math & go to the pumpkin patch but a real for life home school field trip - and we survived : )

we went to alcratraz.

crazy the history that is within 2 hours of us that i've never been to .... this was one of them.  the kids were a little freaked out they'd actually lock us in a cell : ) but other than that we had a really great time.

- - -

a couple things worth mentioning .... 1 as great as scenery pictures are i think when we look back in 30 years i won't care so much about what a jail cell in a prison looked liked as i'll want to remember what benny looked like while we were there. so this trip i stuck with us pictures instead of here's how pretty san francisco looked - though being honest, it's a gorgeous city. rex would up & move us in a heartbeat : ) 2 means it was officially a school field trip we only brought our school age kids .... so no worries we didn't purposefully leave the little girls out of every family shot, they enjoyed a day at grandma's instead.

and last we'll close with can we take a family picture with everyone's hair looking that bad?

yes, yes actually we can : )

- - -

he says the rain has stopped & he's turned off the heater - good night.

 

the little girls had baths.
the boys had showers.
rex has a lunch for tomorrow.
the kitchen is cleaned.
veggies tales is on.
my feet are up : )

rex took sailor out on a date tonight. as much as i'm a fan of dads taking their daughters out, i'm always a little jealous!

as you can tell our pumpkins turned out a little funky. i told rex the square eyes looked mean, he said he was just copying what benny told him to do.

and our caramel apples ..... by morning gravity had really taken affect on the caramel - i don't exactly have april skills : ) but i married in to this crazy talented family so i get to enjoy the perks.

- - -

yes it's now november, yes there is snow on the ground in some parts of the country, yes this was just a few days ago : )

molly's entertainment while we spent way too much time waiting for my computer to be fixed.

- - -

never leave a child unattended in a parked car .... except to remember sweetness.

- - -

think she's seen this once or twice : )

- - -

and last .....

'i & the 'frig are the same, we're both 3 inches!'

alrighty then.

- - -

i just asked rex what i should post.

: )

he laughed & said he had no idea.  yet he practically made me sit down here to post. i tried protesting .... saying how the kitchen was bombed.

he cleaned it. you can see the counter now.

my next excuse was i usually post in the moment .... as in my current state of mind plays into how i type. 

my current state of mind was not worth typing : )

its been a week.  the kind where i send him text messages that say i feel i like i'm out of control in my own house. the kind where we seriously took a day off school for parent/teacher conferences - no joke. the kind where i described the day with words like crap & i don't use that word in every day speech.

on a general i like keeping the focus of my blog on the brighter side - yes i might show you a picture every now & then of my destroyed laundry room or tell you how i can't cook. but blogging about the screaming toddler car ride home or the night we didn't get along and were ok to stay mad w/ each other i tend to leave out.

because we've got it all together & things like paying the late fee on an overdue bill never happen to us? no.
because i'm trying to look good ... to people i've never even met? no.

no. we're living life. real life. we have bad days. we have really bad days. we even have crappy days. honesty is good.

here though, that is not the focus.

on the radio they tell the behind the music to this one song, (which right now i can't even remember the name of) they talk of how when they were writing it they had all this life going on and instead of picking out something from that to write a song about they went past that & said hey we should just write a song to worship God just because He is God. because since He is God He deserves to be worshiped, regardless of how we feel, what we think, what's going on, what's good, what's not.

i like that. 

i could let you now how hairy my legs are right now. how i left the mall not once but twice pushing regan in the stroller as she screamed no! all the way to the car. how rex & i have been hit upside the head this week with reminders to get it right.

that's all true. we don't pretend here. we just believe that in practicing right, in practicing love, in practicing grace, in practicing ...... we'll get better at holding fast, at worshiping God for just being God.

where was all this going? something about why there hasn't been a post in forever. or rex making me post : )

he tells very funny jokes sometimes. the bummer is they are too funny to post. he's been beautiful this week. he's been ok being beat up for things that aren't his fault.

this is where we'll switch topics
- - -

ben was on a motor home trip to north carolina to the gun store.

fyi.

it's a beautiful line. it's full of all sorts of meaning that is worth remembering this week.

it made me smile. i need to smile more.

like this, isn't that beautiful. she's smiling with no care or thought to the fact that her hair is messed up & there is dirt all over her face. she still smiles.

- - -

i seriously traded standing on one of these this week

for a trip here instead.

guilty - i rescheduled baby's appointment & got a pedicure instead.

- - -

she likes being apart of school, her baby came too.

- - -

little friends whose big sisters dressed them up so they too could look princess-y.

- - -

i saw this out our back window & as much as i wanted a better angle, i stuck the camera through the slates of the blinds to not interrupt the moment.

- - - 

the girls & i went to a real for life tea room last week. they poured lemonade in her tea cup for her.

it really was pretty fun - i even drank real tea : )

our little baby now owns 3 things that aren't hand-me-downs. that have been bought especially for him. 2 little outfits are in that bag.

- - -

ben's fort.

followed by ben's b r & f .....

- - -

the kids run, molly & i ride : ) during p.e. !!!

- - -

sharing grapes on the back porch ~

- - -

we're going to make french toast & carve pumpkins tonight. we're also unwrapping caramels to dip apples in .... just cause it sounds fall-ish : )

the pumpkins & caramel apple part, not necessarily the french toast!!!

- - -

he had this great plan to just crawl in bed. i was all for it. i went to the bathroom to brush my teeth ... (i guess already breaking the just crawl in bed part of the rule) and then i couldn't do it. i turned the shower on, i told him it'd be quick.

but who's kidding who.

i never take quick showers : )
i really don't even pretend to - it just always sounds good when i say it.

how can you really just soap up & wash off & turn off the water?? he's teaching the boys how to ... i hear lines like 'mom still has to take a shower, you can't use all the hot water ....'

we went on a date tonight. one of our classic call the babysitter at 4 o'clock dates. she came, the kids were excited. she reads them c.s. lewis books & goes to africa with them in their pretend forts.

we ate delicious food outside on the sidewalk at one of our favorite spots downtown. i even branched out & tried new things off the menu.

regan started calling me mommy today .... not her darling little mum. its sounding more & more like the real mommy. 

gotta say, i liked the mum version. 

she is also done with bottles. i know, horror of horrors that she even still had one at night before she went to bed ..... but she did. past her second birthday - way longer than any kid before her. and now they are gone. she just goes to bed with the girls. she lays there with her blankie waiting to be prayed with & sang to like the rest of them. and then she says bye.

and parts of me go ahhhhh.

sailor came in earlier today & said they were having the best time playing outside together. all 5 of them .... in those forts they made. i told her that was great. and i really meant it.

jack's homework has ran past 5pm the last two nights.  how in the world? you wonder.  well .... he's 6 & last week wasn't normal : )

i need to make a grocery list, things we are out of include orange juice, english muffins, dog food. there's more obviously. milk, we're out of milk.  today we made muffins (using evaporated milk) we made 2 pans or 24 muffins. except one cup wasn't filled so it was really 23 muffins. they came out of the oven around noon. that & only that was lunch - every last one was gone by 12:30.  they thought it was a great lunch. they were sailor's favorite.

here's where i'd type you out the fabulous recipe that the six of us consumed in short order or link you to the great site i found it on.

but ..... the betty crocker cinnamon spice muffin mix in a box can by found on most baking aisles of common grocery stores : )

i sharpied i can do all things through Christ who strengthens me! to the inside cupboard of the door in the laundry room today.  in one of those the sky is falling moments where the only thing i'm good at is making muffins from a boxed mix : )

i use the laundry soap a lot - so i'll see it a lot!

there was a dead snake by the fort house earlier this week.  it was too much for sailor. i have a morbid sense of curiosity ... i had to look.  regan would have stepped right on it she paid that little attention to it. rex doesn't like snakes either - however he wears his man pants well & takes care of those types of things for us : )

i'm actually not in bed anymore. i moved to the couch so he could sleep. i completely freaked him out when i jumped over a stink bug falling on my pillow. he moaned something about needing to call the bug guy .... i tried reminding him i wasn't on good terms with the bug guy.

so i'm sitting in the corner of the couch thinking to myself its warmer than the middle, even though bed has both spots beat.

 

somehow they ranked higher than just paint a little balloon on the cheek at the small town street fair : ) ben's beard slays me.

- - -

 

look - its saturday morning & everyone is there. a first is a lot of saturdays.

its now sunday almost evening .... most of us took naps & we're just kinda slowly waking up. molly is still in bed, which is good : )

regan & rex are making popcorn, she drug the nosiest chair from the table to the counter and is shouting (just 'cause she's that loud) 'pop pop! pop!'

we just have a few pictures from our week. it was a different week ....the kids had colds, school was hit & miss, schedules were rearranged, rex had a birthday.  back to normal this week though - 'cause our life is so normal : )

we went to the pumpkin patch. we pulled into the lot to see 2 big yellow school buses, lovely i thought we'd just blend right in, expect we all didn't have the same shirts on & we didn't all stay in a line : )

it was hot - we weren't there in cozy sweaters & fall boots!

- - -

we stopped by home depot afterward. here's where i could write a whole post on the comments that came from the garden center ladies with orange aprons!  gracious. somehow we made their day : )

- - -

the muffins weren't baking fast enough for her - so she self applied her own butter to an untoasted english muffin.

- - -

yes, that's rex & yes that is his hair .... after it had been cut.  i think one of the kids favorite parts of the week is awana. last weeks theme night was crazy hair & since rex is in charge he decided to go all out : ) 36 colored pig tails that stiffened as they dried.

- - -

she's been watching violin practice lately & thought she was pretty fancy to try it on her own.

- - -

i'm going to take more pictures this week.
we'll be back.

 

doesn't cheesecake sound nice right now?

I think so .... and the bonus for me is there is some in the 'frig.

bonus : )

rex got home early today. early enough that we scrapped naps & went out.

no joke, this is how sister friend fell asleep 12 minutes into the car ride : )

seriously the technology these kids will grow up with .....

we sang happy birthday to rex a few days early as we left the store : )

turns out missing naps today was a terrible idea. the girls could not contain their spent emotions & it was just screams & tears. car rides like that are so much fun. or not. rex wished we lived in town so we could just be home : ) but!! lets go back to that crazy new technology. 

veggie tales on youtube & there was instant quiet.  i love veggie tales. and in that moment i loved modern technology : )

- - -

the boys' violins came this week -

- - -

highlights from school this week.

we had a history lesson about early egypt - the cheapest package of toilet paper from cvs helped to illustrate mummies.

also last week jack got 2 spelling words right on his test. this week he got 11 right.  yay.yay.yay. and yay. again.

- - -

happy weekend .... it starts with cheesecake here : )

i knew from the very early on this baby was a girl. 

after all i was dead on with regan.

and she is very much girl : )

the theory of sick with boys/tired with girls proving true again.

all the way back to seven & six years ago when i was last pregnant with boys i remember the nausea, the i can not look at those eggs or .... i remember the toilet bowl.

all the way back to 4 and two years ago when i was last pregnant with girls i remember the exhaustion, the please let me just sleep, the i've got to eat or ....

i am loving fried eggs right now. i have not thrown up in i don't know how long. my only contact with the toilet bowl is cleaning it from those little boys who now use it : )

i've had that if i don't eat i'm shot feeling - nothing in the moment ever sounded good but once i ate anything it was delicious.

starting at exactly 6 weeks i was just done. there were plenty & many a night when rex would come home to a bombed house, no dinner ... he would put me to bed .... i had barley survived the day.

sailor got excited about having bunk beds in the girls room like the boys had. when people asked i'd say it's a girl.

3 girls in a row. we hadn't had that. that could be fun. we had boys names but we came up with a little girl name.

i'd watch molly & regan and think in another couple years there'd be 3 of them.

sisters. sisters. sisters.  with 2 brothers set nicely in the middle.

sure, we hadn't officially had an ultrasound but ... it was a girl : )

every other now & then we might half think it could be a boy, i mean we don't know for sure but that was always followed by 'but its a girl'

and then remember that ultrasound ... the one where rex slept through half of it : ) she was an all business sort of tech. click. click. measure. type. 'til she got to the end and asked if we wanted to know.

rex was awake by this time and looked at me like it was totally my call.  sure, i said. i thought, i already know. she made some disclaimer line about how she couldn't say 100% but if she had to guess she'd say she was pretty sure it was boy.

rex was smiling ... turns out he wasn't sleeping the whole time & he's actually not to bad at reading ultrasound screens and had already figured it out.

she turned her screen and showed me him.

he's a BOY.

and i have never i really don't think ever been so shocked in my life.

the all business like technician actually smiled, printed off black & white pictures of all his parts & said congratulations.

i said no way! a million times on the way home. i sent 2 all caps texts messages. and rex just smiled.

we are excited & blessed.  crazy blessed & super excited.

sometimes i still can't believe it ..... 
boy.boy.boy.wow.