Pictures of the Kids

Another post! In less than a week! Unbelievable, I know.

A few weeks ago a friend of mine took pictures of the kids for her portfolio. She's a great photographer! So the pictures are now posted on her blog and I will earn myself a nifty surprise if we get 40 comments.

I would be so appreciative if you would click on this link and tell Charlene what you think (pretty, pretty please, I promise your email is not posted and you don't have to sign in). I think the pictures are fabulous. And take a peak at Eli's converse (Kate's actually wearing some too). We're having a renewed love affair with cons at our house.

http://charlenehardyphotography.com/?p=657

Have a happy day!

Did you miss me?

I guess it's been a while since I've posted anything. Well, more than a while. A LONG time. Life isn't quite as predictable as I would like. I'm planning on a lovely post full of pictures in the near future (notice how that's pretty imprecise, I did that on purpose). But for now. . .

Happy Birthday Henry!! The baby is ONE today. Not sure where the last year went, but I'm guessing when I'm resurrected and my body is made perfect my mind will be included and I will remember things again. Maybe?

He's cute and funny and does lots of darling baby things. But currently he's being beat up by his big brother who is mad because Henry is playing with his toy. That means this post is coming to an abrupt end. For kicks here is a picture (all of you photographers tell me how to edit this so it looks decent) of his dracula teeth. This photo is about a month old. The two teeth here were his first teeth. He now has one on the bottom, still no others on the top and these two have gotten bigger so he looks even more vampirish.

Also, be a darling and check out these two links:

http://charlenehardyphotography.com/?p=624

http://charlenehardyphotography.com/?p=647

A friend of mine is building her photography portfolio and she took some pictures of my kiddos. Right now she's only posted some of Kate and they are great! I'm really excited to see the rest.

Running in the Rain

This morning when I got up and realized I had almost slept through my alarm I felt reliefe that i hadn't. Then I looked at my handy temperature reading on the wall, almost 60, beautful. Then I looked out my window.

Kiss it

A few days ago Elijah was carrying on as though he might die, but since this is a normal event for him I wasn't too alarmed. Once he calmed down a bit I asked him what was wrong.

"Ouchie." Imagine a pouty expression and a pudgy finger pointing to his face.

"Your head?" I ask.

Negative.

"Your face?"

Negative.

"Your mouth?"

Negative.

"Young!"

"Young?" Pause. "Tongue?"

Affirmative! He bit his tongue.

"Are you ok now?"

"No, Kiss it."

"I can't kiss your tongue."

"Kiss it!" This time it's a yell with intensity.

I kiss his cheek. "There, all better now."

"No, here," pointing inside his mouth. He then lays his head back with his mouth wide open.

"I can't kiss it, see. . ." I lean over to show him that my lips, luscious and full as they are will not go inside his mouth to kiss his tongue. "Sorry."

"Kiss it Mommy." Now he sticks his tongue out for me and waits expectantly.

Would you kiss the tongue of a two year old?

I did. My lips passed very briefly across his little stuck-out tongue. And he was happy.

Then yesterday I was changing his diaper--a stinky, poopy diaper. He said, "Ouchie Mommy!"

I asked what hurt. He said, "Bum."

I just stared at him, and saying nothing went on with wiping his cute buns.

Ever persistent, he wasn't giving up. He said, "Kiss it, Mommy."

"What?"

"Kiss it, bum."

My two year old told me to kiss his bum!

So now you're wondering if I kissed his behind. I have limits people, I have limits.

Neglected

The blog has been neglected. It's not the only thing. There are plenty of things that get neglected around here. I really try to ensure that my kids aren't among those things. So, for the blog I can only do what I can do and that tells you where it lands on the to do list. I've wanted to put a little tid bit here or add a picture there but we all know where good intentions take us don't we? Here are some random pictures of our goings on lately. . .

Acting out the Nativity on Christmas morning.
We had a wonderful holiday.

Hot tubbing at the hotel pool on a little Seattle getaway after Christmas

Valentine's Day

Basketball season has come and gone. I love basketball because: 1) It's great exercise. 2) It's a fun winter activity. 3) If we are lucky it's like each child having 3 play dates a week (2 practices, one game) with a bunch of friends for six weeks. 4) It's super fun to watch them discover the game and enjoy themselves. It's pretty much good clean fun for all involved. This was Nathanael's first year. He can be a spaz (a "cool" word from my youth that is the perfect description of Nathanael) as evidenced below. Kate likes to play, though she has yet to understand why people get so worked up about this game. There is not a competitive bone in this girl, unless of course Nathanael is trying to beat her to the car. Then she transforms before our eyes. This year she was a great defender. She would stay on her opponent like no other. Who really cares where the ball is? In the picture you can see that the girl with the ball is behind her, but her eyes are glued to her opponent. Ethan had a great year. He's all arms and legs right now and can have a hard time making all those parts work together!

Just made a basket

She's not letting that girl out of her sight

Basketball 2010

Henry being protected from some ball playing in the basement

St. Patrick's Day

It's started again. . .

We spent three days of our Spring Break in Seattle. We saw old friends, went to the zoo & Pacific Science Center and hung out with The Joe Ellsworths. Thank you Joe and Sam!

Elijah talking to the bears

Ethan, Nathanael and Kate catching a cat nap after the zoo

The butterfly house with two babies; one exhausted,
the other covered with spit up.
I hope I didn't just sit on an endangered butterfly, but I had to sit down.
My soul keenly feels Elijah's expression.

Ethan and Gunner playing chess, life size


Easter Sunday 2010

Happy Easter! Since our spring break was this week we didn't have any soccer games or other activities on Saturday so we were able to be home and listen to conference. It was awesome! Conference is always so good. I feel especially motivated to read the talks more often during these next few months.

I'd like to think I will revisit our little corner of cyberspace more often, but I guess that remains to be seen.

Haircut

When Kate did this. . .
We decided the clippers needed to have a meeting with Elijah.

Much better.

Totally Two

One day around Eli's second birthday while I was feeding Henry, Elijah was doing his usual. . . Find some way to get attention from mom routine. He picked up something off the ground and said, "Eeewwwww gross!" Then laughed hysterically as soon as I looked over at him.

Then he found the stool (his new favorite way of getting anything and everything) and carried it over to the sink and started grabbing everything he could and throwing it on the floor before I could stop him. Then he laughed some more. At that moment I wondered to myself, "Where did my baby go? How did he grow up so fast?" Shortly after that I thought, "I really need to hide this stool or get rid of it." I'm sure removing the stool will somehow thwart his development. But it's become his #1 tool for satisfying his curiosity sans parental supervision.

Elijah turned two on December 9th. He is so very entertaining. He's saying (or trying to say) so many things. He's recently added, "Barf" to his vocabulary. I have no doubt one of the big kids taught him that but no one is telling who it was. Although he's super cute, he's also quite a handful and if you turn your back, watch out. In just a few moments he has likely colored on himself or something else (thank you to the inventor of washable markers!),

snagged one of the older kids' toys or gotten a hold of a treat and he's quietly trying to confiscate the evidence, like he did with this banana bread.

It was whole and sealed in the bag at the back of the counter before he snagged the aforementioned stool and went to town.

Each time my kids have reached this age and their curiosity levels rise to the height of teenage hormones I am amazed at the things they do and the things they understand and the ways they try to get what they want. I struggle with thoughts that I am obliterating any creativity he might have but, we have to have some semblance of order don't we?

Happy Birthday Elijah!