My little con artists

The other day Hannah, Benton, and Will kept throwing all of their balls from the backyard over our fence. I had to keep coming out and getting the balls from the other side. Finally I told them if they did that again, their balls would have to stay over the fence. So what did they do? They threw the balls over the fence.

So, a little while later I caught them bribing our five year old neighbor to get all of their balls for them!

I have to say I was proud!

The "stomach flu" rears its' ugly head....

We have gone three whole months without the stomach flu. I thought the season had past. I became overly confident that it would not strike our house for the rest of the school year. Boy was I wrong!

Hannah was the first to get hit with it. But Hannah is a pro at this. She has had it at least once a year, and sometimes more, since she was about nine months old. When she got it this time she would just wake up, throw up in the designated bowl, and then go right back to sleep.

We hoped that she would be the only one, but alas, last night Benny started saying that "food needed to come out of his stomach". Now, Benny is a novice to this whole throwing up thing, so I thought I would be smart. I first sat him in front of the toilet on a chair and told him that is where the food needs to go. After about half an hour of waiting he was getting tired so I came up with what I thought was a very smart plan. I would lay Benny on his bed and put the bucket next to the bed. Then I laid on the other side of him so that when the time came, I would be right there to direct him so as to avoid a huge mess.

Ummmm, I wouldn't advice this........let's just say the plan backfired completely! Benny woke up about 30 minutes later, turned towards me, and just let it all out! My arm, my hair, and my clothes were the bucket! (and I thought I was so smart.....)

This is Benny enjoying a nice warm bath after the whole episode. I am glad that he feels better, because it probably goes without saying that I now have the bug, and Will has joined the club as well. And Will is handling this sickness true to form. When he needs to throw up, he runs over to me or Ray, gets taken to the sink to do his stuff, gets cleaned up, then runs off again as if nothing has happened.

Fun times!

Tell me, are we crazy???

This is a picture of our kitchen on Monday.

This is a picture of our kitchen Tuesday. Do you notice anything missing??

Here is our living room. Why is that man standing on the dirt underneath the house instead of the living room floor you might ask??? Oh ya, it's because there is no floor!!





Did I mention that we move in next Saturday?

Now, many people have asked me if I am stressed about this, and the honest answer is I am not feeling the stress yet. So there won't be a working shower, who needs to shower? Who needs a bathroom sink when you can just as easily brush your teeth in the garage sink? We will just be going on a "camping trip" in our new house.

It all works out in the end right?

What a fun Easter weekend!

Benton and Will were so excited about going to hunt for Easter eggs that they held hands to the whole way there!

Will is in the zone for the hunt.

We snapped this picture right after we had gotten the kiddies all ready. We knew that the outfits and the hair had a life span of 5 minutes. Which turned out to be about right. As soon as we sat down in church Will ripped off his tie and kicked off his shoes. Benny on the other hand was so excited to be wearing a "tie like daddy" and to have an actual belt. (he would have worn just the tie and belt if we had let him) And Hannah wanted her hair to be all curly so we used the pink sponges. Now that brought back some memories! I had to contain myself from teasing all of the curls to create the perfect 80's "poodle fro".

Happy Easter!

How does he do it?

Our house is slowly coming together. Ray has been over there working away until as late as 4:00 a.m. every night this week.

How does he do it you might ask?

Well, after a bit of investigating I found the secret to his endless energy supply.

He basically drinks shots of straight sugar or salt, followed up by a quick snack of trans-fat, chocolate, more sugar,saturated fat, and it looks like he does throw some pecans into the mix.

He also has a great two man crew.

Wherever he goes, they are right there next to him ready to help. They are so well trained. As soon as he sets a power tool down, they are ready to pick it up off the floor and start using it on the nearest object.

It really helps Ray to always have another person there, checking to make sure he is doing it right.

And they are excellent at making sure they get their sugar shots, and chocolate trans-fat concoction's too.

Well, whatever Ray's strategy is, it does seem to be working!

The Field Trip

I just love going on school field trips. Is that weird? I swear I get as excited as Hannah about going.

I find myself trying to figure out how the next 12 years are going to play out for these kids. I think I have it all figured out about who the popular kids are going to be, who will be the jocks, who will be the "nerds", etc.

It is just refreshing to be around these kids because no matter what their differences are, they are all friends. It is so sweet, and so silly how that all changes in High School. I don't know, maybe it was just the High School I went to, or maybe I am confusing it with the movie Can't Buy Me Love. Now that was a great movie!

No endless egg salad this year!

This year I thought we would take a new approach to the whole egg dying thing. In the past we have boiled a gazillion eggs and dyed them. Which was always fun, but it was always hard for the kids to give up their eggs to make egg salad. They would rather tote them around in their baskets for the next few weeks. ( which I don't really recommend....the eggs will get really smelly, and you will find some months later at the bottom of the toy box...)

So, this year we painted wooden eggs.

Hannah is in her element.

Benton is still going through his, "I'm too cool to smile" phase. Or maybe he is trying to say, "I am too cool for this, but I am willing to humor my mom"

And William was just happy to be trusted with a paint brush and a hard wooden object.

The finished product

Ummm, ya, it's a little messy........