Oh Man!

    Has it really been this long!  Gross!  I have spent wayyyy too much time on FaceBook to say that I've been too busy.
    I was a bit creeped out when looking for this blog (it HAS been too long) via Google.  The first thing that popped up were images of the children on the 'images' option.  So, hm.  Rethinking all this and may have to go another route more secure or figure out how to hide The Free Tree better.
    Aside from all that.  Life is quickly passing.  The boys no longer insist on my being a princess.  I have moved into the elderly queen status.  Having four/five kids will do that to a person.  Ha!
    Ranne has become quite the bookworm.  He's always loved the story so is enjoying curling up with a book, any book, and getting lost.  I'm often quite impressed when asking him to read certain excerpts I'm sure he'll not know.  He usually does.  Oh, how we underestimate children!
    He's a great helper around the house and is now big enough to do certain chores like sweeping, putting away dishes, reading to brothers before nap, and working in the yard with effectiveness.   He's very capable.  Our biggest challenge lately with school has been boredom.   It's hard to be diligent to details when bored.  But, it's important to learn diligence no matter what.  So, once we get to the point of diligence...how much fun we'll have with challenge!

Learning about coal.

Blissfully enjoying Dad time.

A day at the fair was fun, learning about different kinds of fire fighting tools.

    Toby is like...well, I call him my spider monkey.  He's extremely attentive to what's going on and experiencing it all, especially the mood of it.  He's full of energy and physical talent and wants to be LOVED!    He involved Claire and Trey really well in the play but wants to be part of the big kids' play.  He likes to listen and be close.  He is a bit of a fearful little fellow, though.  So trying to teach trust has been fun.

 



 








    Trey really doesn't care at all what anyone thinks about him.  He wants to be one-on-one though and enjoys company with gentleness.  He's a lot like his dad.  He is JUST getting into his Lego creations having stories to go with them.  He does like perfection.  When his favorite puppy lost an eye, he was done with it.  When I super glued it back on, it was his best buddy again.  Iiieeee.

    Claire is...girly.  Her voice has more tones to it.  She already dances around and likes to wear sparkles.  She has an obsession with shoes, very unlike her mom.  Aside from that, and unrelated to gender, she is extremely opinionated about what she wants.  She knows she wants a cracker and it is either a saltine, a Ritz, or a graham cracker.  One will not work in place of another.  She's not ugly about it but definitely shuns the offending snack.  She's great with her pleases and thank yous.  She's also discovered screaming when unhappy.  Thankfully we deal with that less frequently all the time, and it's been rare.

State Fair

Happy Birthday!

So short!

Before we got her a necklace.

    School has been HARD!  Schooling with no set curriculum is NOT my skill and I'm so impressed with people to whom it comes easily.  Thank you for all the time you spent putting your ideas online for us to use.  You saved us these last 13 weeks!  We now have books and I'm super excited and relieved.  We begin those in full force tomorrow, as long as everyone is well.  The kids have been awesome and smart and forgiving.
    That's all for now.  I've been up since about 3am.  Ug.  And hey, we're now 27 weeks along on number five.  Time could go a LITTLE faster.
 

Funny Face

The Continuation:

These shiny little eyes!

The grass is green!

One Saturday morning, I walked around the house to see all these sweet scenes: Dad and Trey talking, Claire playing well alone in her room and the boys creating in the living room.  What a nice, peaceful time!

Toby disappeared outside one weekday morn.  He was gone for too long so when checking on him, I discovered he made a fire ring.  He is really ready for camping this summer!

Helping Mama with laundry:

I just can't resist funny face pictures!

Toby informed us he was standing on Cody's Jeep's mustache.  Quite fitting to the trend these days.  That mustache is Tobe's favorite perch when "Spoon", i.e. Cody,  is around.

An Aunt Sarah bow.  We're having fun with these.

Too sweet.

"You should see the pogo stick!"  He's now ready to buy one with his saved birthday money.  Imagine that!

Random abandoned art:

I was sure they were causing trouble to discover this instead.

The Annual Ponderosa Area-Wide BBQ was a couple weeks ago.  The college kids go a night early for their ladies' and men's studies as well as to help set-up the next day.  We play in the creek.  The BBQ was much better attended than the year before.  It was a great weekend!

 Around the house:

Her mouth hung open as she watched Scott tear apart her bed to lower the mattress.  It was funny.

Bible Time scene.  Those sweet little feet sticking out...sigh.

So I handed her my blush, making sure the lid was on extra tight.  Little Houdini figured it out after five minutes of trial.

Sweetie Pie.  The flowers were given to me for Mother's Day!  Though I think I killed them today, not watering them in the heat.  I feel terrible!  We'll work on their revival, but I'm dreading the thought that they're a goner.  I've never had such pretty flowers. 

 Characters.

Again, a sucker for funny faces:

 She gave Trey several kisses through the crib after a good nap.  

Tired!

That's him:

The very first time to pull herself up to standing.  Now she will rarely sit.

She gave herself two fat lips.  She will fall on her face while doing nothing but crawling down the hall.  I REALLY don't like it.  The little fat area scabbed over and is now peeling after only three days.  They heal so fast, for which I'm grateful!

"Helping" Mom make brownies.

He's so tall now!