Wednesday, May 29, 2019

Photo Every Hour: May 21st

6:30 AM Best news ever to wake up to--meet my new niece Lucy!
7:00 Someone wanted to hang out in his bed instead of getting up this morning. And of course, he's chewing on his lambie #allthetime #itssogross

8:00 When it is a dreary, rainy, windy day that will potentially break the recorded coldest "high" temperature...

9:00 You head to the best indoor play place in town!

10:00 I spy Garrett...

11:00 Time for lunch!

12:00 Getting a few rounds of bowling in before nap time

1:00 Lunchtime for Mommy

2:00 Researching the candidates for the school board election... Tonight... #procrastination #atleastIresearchedbeforeIvoted

3:00 Picking my mom up so we can head to...

4:00 Costco!

5:00 Cooking up some buttermilk pork chops for dinner

6:00 And that's a wrap on dinner!

7:00 I should be getting the kids ready for snacks and bedtime.... But just one more piece!

8:00 On my way to the hospital to meet Lucy!

9:00 Look at the sweet little peanut! She aspirated on some meconium during delivery, so she got to hang out in the NICU for a few days before heading home

10:00 Again with the procrastination... Tomorrow is our anniversary so I stopped at Target on the way home to get a card for Darrell

Heading to bed!

Connor said "haha" to our initial attempt to go to bed... But now it's bedtime for real!

Tuesday, May 21, 2019

Photo Every Hour: April 21st

Whoops! Apparently I forgot to post the pictures from this day. Which is kind of funny, because my pictures from this day are inconsistent at best. You see, April 21st feel on Easter Sunday. And I debated taking pictures on a different day (because, after all, the 21st is just a totally arbitrary day that I happened to pick one time and just stuck with), but then I figured that part of my intent with these picture days is to capture snipets of our every day life, no matter the circumstances--not to intentionally photograph a day that lends itself well to being documented. So, even though there were hours that I forgot to snap a picture (or physically couldn't because I didn't have my phone on me on the hour), I'm still glad to have this (somewhat scattered) account of our Easter Day. Even if it did take me a full month to get around to posting it.

7:00 Happy Easter! He is Risen--and I'm up and at 'em as well! I recently joined the choir at church, and I'm also in the adult hand chime group, and both groups were performing on Easter Sunday, which meant I needed to be at church bright and early for the 8:00 AM service

8:00 Okay, so honestly, I took this picture at like 9:15, but it's a solid representation of where I was at eight

9:00 Since I can't drive Darrell's car (comfortably--darn stick shift) and since he can't fit all three boys in his car, I had to run back to the house after the service to pick him and the boys up to take them to church for the Easter Sunday breakfast that the youth serve

10:00 Squeezing in one last run through of our hand chimes piece before the second service begins at 10:30

11:00 Darrell read the story for the Children's Message at the service. If you look closely you can see my three handsome boys in their ties and bow ties

12:00 Grabbing a quick lunch before nap time (and yes--William is reading at the table and Garrett has the hood to his sweatshirt up. I have no idea)

1:00 Boys are napping, and I need to find a dinner roll recipe that I can whip up before heading to my parent's house for Easter dinner. Nothing like waiting until the last minute

2:00 Mixing up the dough!

3:00 At my parent's house, waiting for the dough to finish rising so I can start making the rolls

4:00 Someone fell off his bike and scraped his elbow. And he was totally fine, up until the moment he realized it was bleeding. This kid has a pretty serious blood phobia, and absolutely would not calm down until we got a band aid on it

5:00 Hunting for Easter baskets. It's so nice that the Easter bunny visits Grandma and Grandpa's house so that Mom and Dad don't have to worry about him at their house!

6:00 The remnants of a solid Easter feast (and I'd make a snide comment about my sister being the last one at the table eating, but she legitimately was nursing Harrison for the first part of the meal. So she had a good excuse--this time)

7:00 Squeezing in every last little bit of play time before we head home for bed time!

8:00 William got this book set for his birthday, so we've been working on reading "The Fantastic Mr. Fox" for their bedtime story. It's been pretty enjoyable so far

9:00 Not quite ready to call it a night--the TV is on and we're vegging out, but I've still got some bills to get paid before I can totally check out for the night

Bedtime! No idea what happened to 10:00, but I'm sure I was relaxing on the couch and not even attempting to think about doing anything productive

Tuesday, April 30, 2019

William: Six Years!

My dear sweet Kindergartener. What a year this past one has been. He has grown up so much it's incredible--yet terrifyingly sad. But, let's focus on the fun stuff, shall we?
How handsome is my sweet boy in his school photo?!?
Birthday Interview

Age: 6
Height: 3 ft 8.25 inches
Weight: 45 lbs 2 oz
(Not that it matters much for the numbers, but as a fun aside, William's well visit was originally scheduled for the day after his birthday, but had to be rescheduled because he had a snow day from school that day and I didn't really want to mess with hauling the three boys out in a snow storm.)
This picture screams summer--and happy boy with his new basketball
What is your favorite color? Blue
What is your favorite animal? Monkey (Never would have guessed that, but whatever)
What is your favorite book? "Cookie Monster and the Cookie Tree" (He actually took this book to school when he was star of the week back in December, so I guess it really must be a favorite)
What is your favorite song? Joy to the World (I was actually surprised by this; our church had been singing "Lord I Need You" as our Lenten praise song and he pretty much learned the whole thing by heart in just a few weeks)
Someone still love his trains, and got the chance to drive one at a model train show this past year
What is your favorite sport? Football
What is your favorite thing to do with Mom? Go on my birthday outing (I'm a little disappointed with this; he's been obsessed with playing Guess Who since Garrett got it for his birthday, although to be fair, he'll play with anyone and not just me)
What is your favorite thing to do with Dad? Play with the tan blanket (Yeah. Let's just say they make up some silly sleeping/twisting/rolling up games with that blanket)
What is your favorite thing to do outside? Play golf
Rain, snow, or shine--yep, this kid loves his golf
Where is your favorite place to go? Museum (short for the Museum of Visual Materials where they have lots of fun kid's activities, although we truthfully usually go while he is at school because they close at four so he's only been there a few times this past year)
What is your favorite fruit? Pineapple (A little surprising, considering that it can be hard to get good ones this far north, but whatever)
What is your favorite vegetable? Carrots (one of the few answers that stayed the same since last year, and I'm kind of surprised he isn't sick of them because we tend to cook a lot of them, especially in the winter)
What is your favorite cereal? Lucky Charms (duh. What kid's isn't?)
What is your favorite treat? Hersheys (What can I say. The kid likes his chocolate)
What is your favorite meal? Red Beans and Rice (Yum)
Also delicious? S'mores
What makes you happy? Playing with Mommy and Daddy (Aw. Yay)
What makes you sad? When no one plays with me and when Garrett shouts "NO" at me (sadly, the latter one happens more than I care to admit. Garrett has a pretty large attitude on him for his rather small size)
Who are your best friends? Kason and Oriya
What do you want to be when you grow up? Policeman
What was your favorite part about last year? Go to the beach
What s one thing you want to do this year? Go to mini putt at the beach
Fearless boy at the beach. Sometimes it terrifies me, but Darrell assures me he's perfectly fine. Which also kind of terrifies me--I've heard stories about Darrell's antics as a kid and they aren't exactly reassuring
See also--handsome boy loving some mini putt at the beach
I feel like there are so many things I need to write to remember about William at this age, and yet I feel like there is no way I could even begin to write enough to accurately portray the wonderfulness that is my William. Since I don't really get around to blogging near as often as I'd like, though, I think I'll just share a bunch of pictures and let them do the talking.

The hat says it all. Despite all my nervousness and apprehension about William starting Kindergarten, he absolutely rocked it. And continues to rock it every day. We couldn't be more proud of him

Puzzles have become a huge thing for him. He has put together multiple 1000 piece puzzles--with a fair amount of help sorting the pieces, mind you, but he puts every single piece in by himself

At my cousin's wedding last summer the boys got to have Shirley Temples. We're pretty sure it was the first time they've ever had soda, and they couldn't stop giggling about the bubbles tickling their tummies

Not surprisingly, William was the only kid to make it through the Twins game awake. Although to be fair, I'm pretty sure he fell asleep at his first Twins game when he was fifteen months old, so it all balances out

So I'm a little surprised that bowling didn't come up anywhere in his birthday interview, because after a summer using the Kids Bowl Free program, this kid has been in love with bowling 

Someone was much more excited to go to day camp this summer--we'll see how he does this summer when he gets to go for full days instead of just half days

William usually isn't much for arts and crafts, but he did have fun at a story time at a pottery place and didn't do a half bad job painting his dragon

It took a little coaxing to get him on the tube, but he certainly enjoyed himself once we got started. Needless to say, this wasn't the only time he went tubing last summer

We had to miss one of the Augustana University Football games this fall, but this boy was very happy to discover that they livestream their games. Between football, basketball, and now a few baseball games, this boy is quickly becoming a hardcore Viking supporter. He even knew a handful of the basketball players by name and would get excited when "his" guys were on the court

I simply adore this picture from our family photo shoot this past fall, and I suspect I will only grow to love it more as the years go on

Happy Sixth Birthday Sweet Boy! You've been a rockstar on your new bike--and so many other things this past year. We love you!