one year ago

one year ago i was wishing desperately to go into labor and it had nothing to do with cankles.







(maybe this post should have started with a WARNING: ugly feet label?!)

i really wanted my little girl to be born in july and not in august, like her estimated due date predicted. after all, july has a prettier birthstone and we then we could share birthday month (i celebrate all month long, don't you?) well, one year ago the clock was ticking. i only had two days left.

tick-tock.

she was not born in july and the cankles only got bigger. i gained 7 pounds during my last week of pregnancy. 

only 6 more days until natalie's first birthday. last year those were the longest six days. this year they are going to FLY by. eek!!

craft thursday #4: dancing cows

UPDATE
i forgot to credit my source for the dancing cow idea. i found this project at deep space sparkle. it's listed in the1st grade project section and i am totally planning on doing this with my first graders, too

to make dancing cows you will need:



first, we dressed in cow costumes and spent some time crawling around in the backyard grass. just kidding. we did begin with a game of freeze dance though. if you are not familiar with freeze dance, you play music, move to the music, stop the music and freeze. as we stood there frozen, we examined the position of our bodies--where our hands were placed, were both hands pointing in the same direction, were both feet on the ground, were our torsos twisted or bent? then we danced, froze, and examined again. i challenged the boys to come up with a new pose each time.







next i directed the boys in drawing a cow. we practiced using pencil and paper. when they were comfortable drawing a dancing cow, i gave them a black oil pastel and they drew their cow with that. we talked about coloring in the spots fully to make them pop. they could add details in the background or not. finally we painted using watercolors.













it was a fun project and once the kids got going, they worked at their own pace and did their things. i love the way they turned out.


zachary


benjamin


taylor

seriously, who wouldn't love a dancing cow picture framed in their kitchen? so cute!

i gotta feeling...

that tonight's gonna be a good night....

those are lyrics to a song i played every single night for my baby bump one year ago. i was so ready to meet my newest munchkin, but at the same time, i didn't really want to go into labor at home. i couldn't help but play the song anyway. again and again and again.

tonight zach, natalie, and i went to target to pick up a few things for her first birthday. it's in 8 days. oh man. my baby will soon not be a baby anymore.


getting ready for a swim


splashing in the water is so much fun!


so is floating and kicking


this picture is for aunt jen--natalie is wearing jayden's dress!

i'll probably be posting a lot about natalie this week. i can't believe her first birthday is already here.

sigh.

a new family fave!

two weeks ago we took taylor and zachary to the drive-in movies to see cars 2. this was on our summer list.



i hadn't been to the drive-in movies since high school. when i told my mom that, she laughed and said "me too!" ha!! we packed a goody bag with popcorn, sour patch kids, and bottles of water. we all had a nice time and thanks to tips on yelp.com, we didn't damage our car on the pothole riddled pavement!



next time we will arrive earlier so we don't have to wait so long to get in. to make matters worse, we picked the slowest line and then when we were almost there, one of the cars in our lane overheated. bummer! apparently people at the drive-ins don't listen to the kaiser radio ad promoting random acts of kindness and their link to happiness and health, because based on my experience no one at the drive-in will willingly let you cut in front of them. another bummer!

our family will definitely be going back to the drive-ins. not sure when we'll take ben along with us. ben's crazy meter shoots off the charts after 7:00 pm. the drive-ins provided us with some fun, family-friendly, and inexpensive entertainment. if you haven't been to a drive in since high school, go!

have you ever been to a drive-in movie? 

when did you last go?

july in pictures

we've been busy checking things off our summer list. school starts aug. 10th. that's right around the corner. gotta get check, check, check while we can, can, can.

i will post soon about some of our recent adventures. for now, enjoy some photos!


















































that was a lot of pictures! i realize there are not many of taylor and that is because the boy doesn't want to be photographed like the other hams in our house. "too old, too cool, too busy." i remember going through that phase. i'm pretty sure it means puberty is around the corner.

darn. i was hoping my kiddos would skip that stage entirely. ha!

35 things

have you heard of this? i first saw this a couple of years ago on another blog. the list was harder to make than i thought it would be. i look forward to checking things off though. i'll post it again next year and let you know what i did and didn't do.

35 things i want to do when i'm 35... 

1. sew a pillowcase dress

2. learn to play the guitar

3. make a skirt

4. make homemade cinnamon rolls

5. go camping

6. go to the snow

7. have date night once a month

8. run a 5k

9. paint my bathroom

10. make 5 freezer meals--one for each wednesday during a given month

11. re-do hallway pictures

12. organize kids' storage bins

13. send birthday cards to family and friends

14. read harry potter, book 1, to my children

15. make another (better) rainbow cake

16. get a family picture taken

17. go out to dinner in a dress

18. eat clean for one month

19. write to sony at least every other month

20. go to seattle

21. lose 10 pounds

22. take kids to the ocean

23. organize family photo albums

24. ben's baby book--1st year

25. natalie's baby book--1st year

26. go to nevada

27. visit great grandpa

29. support darien at disney world

30. visit family in michigan

31. teach kids how to do their own laundry-ha!

32. design and make a headboard for our bed

33. go on field trips with my kids

34. tile bathroom floor

35. write a children's story

i wonder what i'll do first... :) 

leave a comment with your suggestion!

saturday

35.

that's how old i almost am.

today we had a family party to celebrate me turning 35. that's how old i will turn on monday at 11:37 am. and not a minute sooner. can't say i am crazy about turning 35. i mean, that's half way to 70.

i did have a very nice party and i loved being treated like a queen. i had yummy bbq chicken and salad and sweet potato fries. oh, and cake. i know i said i don't like cake all that much and that is still true. except for this cake...


love this photo because ben and i are blowing out the candles and taylor is yelling at us "you are blowing out UNLIT candles, you know!" (the wind had blown them out already)

this is chocolate godiva cake and it is amazing in every way and if i made it, i know it wouldn't be nearly as good. my mom has to make it. she makes it sooooo good. i have had this cake every year for my birthday for as long as i can remember... since i've been 21, anyway. see the cake balls and cake pops in the picture? those are for the little rascals. no godiva cake for them, which means i have half a birthday cake left to keep in my freezer and snack on for the next few weeks.

thank you family for the lovely evening. and a special thank you to my mom for going the extra mile and making my special birthday cake dairy free this year! :)

i LOVE friday

today was a good day!

i encountered several very nice drivers on the road. wish i could say people stopped and waved me in more often. such a simple, but really kind thing to do. today it happened more than once. LOVE that.

i had coffee and a leisurely stroll with a friend. it's nice to get out sans some of my kids and have some grown up time. plus when you have cute babies with you, people usually smile when you walk by. LOVE that.

i went to the doctor and weighed less on their scale than the one i have at home. it's a doctor's scale, so it must be right. LOVE that.

i bought some baby food at whole foods and the cashier said i could go back and get two more packs... free! LOVE that. she also said my baby is cute (which she is). LOVE that, too.

i observed my children helping each other on different occasions without a grown up asking them to do it. LOVE, LOVE, LOVE that!

i don't have to make dinner... it's pizza and movie night. LOVE that.

so many wonderful things crammed into one friday. i hope you LOVED your friday, too. 

  now tell me something good about your day.

thursday randomness

no craft to post about today. we have been running here and there and everywhere. or so it seems. but we did craft today, so next thursday i will post some darling paintings of dancing cows and dancing kids. i know, i know. it will be sooo hard to wait! so here's a sampling to tide you over.


too cute, right? any guesses as to whose cow this is?

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this morning the boys were having mandatory outside time. does anyone else have to force their kids to play outside? we've had a few incidents of mud fighting recently, so before i left them to make mud pies  unsupervised i nonchalantly reminded them that people with good character make good choices and do the right thing even when they think no one is looking. ha!

i'm just going to say this...
my children are a work in progress.

and now i will show you this...

 
and this...

i was so mad. i did not yell though. i think i whined a little. seriously? you did this again? seriously?!!! then i filled a bucket with soap and water and brought out a broom and scrub brush and some towels. they cleaned it up. as best as a 4 year old and 6 year old can. after zach hosed off the patio and it dried, ben cleaned the window and zach set up the table again. all by themselves. that made me feel a lot better.


what do you do when your kids keep making the same "mistakes"?

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when the boys were babies, they spent a lot of time cooling down in a bucket. buckets are the perfect for pint sized fun! i will have to see if i can find pictures of the boys in their buckets.

last week we finally had the chance to put natalie in a bucket and let her splash around. this girl LOVES water! she had so much fun.






she has recently started pulling herself up to stand and she did that in the bucket. no pictures of that though. scary!

i seem to remember a picture of me and my brother swimming in buckets at grandma lorraine's when we were little.  

 mom?

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6 weeks ago we decided to cut ben's hair. shave it off and give him a summer cut. like his dad and brothers.

this is what his hair looks like today...


i cannot bring myself to cut it! it's his benny -fro. now i think i'll just let it grow and grow and grow. i think i'm afraid that if i cut it, it will never be the same.  

what would you do?

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if you have more than one kid you know just how hard it is to get a good picture of all the kids together at the same time. you know, a picture with everyone simply looking at the camera. smiling would be a bonus. well i haven't done that yet, but i did get a good shot of 3/4 of the parker kids. enjoy!


"ahhh!!! he's gonna push me in the pooool!"


"aaarr! whatcha be lookin' at?"


i wonder what they are looking at?



winner winner chicken dinner!

as busy as we are some days, i sure do love summer and being at home with my kids is the best!