The kids colored Easter eggs today.

Family visit.

This weekend we enjoyed a a short visit from Chris' brother, his wife and kids. The kids, of course, enjoyed getting to spend time with some of their cousins that they haven't seen in a while. Within about an hour of them leaving our house this afternoon, not surprisingly, Sophie was already upset and "missing Kylee and Britnee!" Here are the girls zonked out on the futon together.

I love this picture! Such cute kids.

Thanks for visiting, guys. Hope you had a fun trip.

Spring break, or something like that.

Today was the first day of the kids' spring break, and this is how they spent the day. As I've been seeing on many of my friends' blogs, we're not the only ones experiencing extended winter weather. I just have to laugh when we see people out and about, at the store, at church, wherever, and they say "Can you believe this weather??" I'm thinking, uh, yeah. We've lived here for 4 and a half years now and it's the same every year: winter doesn't officially end until June, because there's always a chance for more snow around here!

Derby??

Tonight Chris took Noah to participate in his Boy Scouts' Pinewood Derby. Strangely, the leaders had decided not to make it a "competition", per se, because they didn't want anyone to feel bad about losing. I don't quite understand. It seems to me that in an attempt to protect our children from feeling the blow of failure, we are taking away from them the opportunity to learn how to deal with disappointment and become fair players. If we're constantly telling them how great they are, and giving out kudos left and right, regardless of how much they've worked for it or earned it, we aren't giving them much to motivate them to try harder or do better. Just my opinion...I'm not sure why I've been on my soapbox so much lately?
Anyway, Noah enjoyed himself because he got to be with his friends and play with cars. :)

Something funny.

I was just sitting at the computer while Sophie was doing an art project with glitter glue and Popsicle sticks at the table. She was talking to herself, jabbering away, when I suddenly tuned in to what she was saying, and here's what I heard: "All the boys are eX-ed out of this house, except Jesus, he can stay. But Noah, Sam, and Nick have to go!" I guess this is how it is when you're the only girl in a family full of boys!

He's 9!

Today is Noah's 9th birthday. We celebrated last night with cake, ice cream and presents, since Chris is working all day today. We had our little "party" out in our camp trailer, which we de-winterized this week. Who knows when we'll get our first chance of the year to head out in it, but we've all had spring fever, so it was fun just to hang out in the camper. Then Chris slept out in it with the 3 older kids, and they stayed up late and had fun.
Happy birthday, Noah!

To know her is to love her.

This morning I was working out on the treadmill with the TV on, when Sophie came in the room talking a mile a minute about something or other. All of a sudden she stopped cold, staring at the TV, she said: "Oh, man! I LOVE this commercial!" (See above link to said commercial.) Hey, Wizard of Oz reference, chocolate chip cookies, what's not to love? I don't know how this girl got so much personality. She makes me laugh everyday.