Lauren-Lulu

Ok, so here is the update on our little girl. She is SO FUNNY. We are laughing at things she says and does all of the time. She loves to sing and can sing just about anything she hears once. The latest funny is her pronunciation of Halleluia.(May not be as funny as my spelling) She sings Hale woo a, and she says it three times really fast. She is always up to something. We laughed when we found piggy this way. I think it was a case of really bad diaper rash!

She loves all the girl stuff like makeup and baby dolls. She is fascinated with Cinderella even though she has never seen the movie. We love to watch all the new things she learns about. She gives away lots of love! She will come up to me when I am busy and hug and kiss me and say "I love you too Mama." How sweet is that???!!!

She loves her brothers especially Ethan. He plays with her alot and doesn't aggrivate like Aaron. Aaron loves to hear her squeal so he takes her stuff and runs so she will chase him. Sounds like a lot of fun at this house huh?

Oh Fudge!

This weekend we had the opportunity to keep Fudge-the 4th grade classroom pet. Fudge is a guinea pig. He has had a good time at our house this weekend. He has enjoyed lots of good lettuce and lots of noise. He is a little nervous when we let him out of his cage because of all the activity here. He mostly makes happy gurgle sounds. He did let us hear his shreak today when we were cleaning his cage. I think he just wanted back in to get some of the fresh lettuce we put in there. The kids have just loved watching him and petting him and introducing him to our kitten-at a safe distance of course. So I couldn't resist posting some pictures of our weekend guest.

Long Time--No Blog

I know, it has been awhile since I have updated. Honestly, I have been a little frustrated with this blog because I can't caption my pictures. I acutally did a post about Lauren but when I published it, pictures where everywhere! So, in my frustration, I just deleted it. I hope this gets easier.
Things are good here. The action never stops unless we are all asleep. All of my children are well. Can I just say that again??? WE ARE ALL WELL!!!! Thank you God for good health. The boys are in school- not loving it but they are there doing their work. Brendan just got his report card with all a's. Ethan and Aaron aren't really receiving letter grades. Lauren has been helping me and Meme renovate the office. We are actually moving everything from the old office to the one that has been used for storage because it is much bigger. Imagine 9 years worth of storage from three or more families. Well, we cleaned all of that out, removed all the traces of the "critters" that had moved in, and put a fresh coat of paint( well, actually 2 coats) on all of the walls. As we were cleaning the baseboards, someone suggested that we get new ones so that is our next step. Today the carpet is being steam cleaned so we got a little break from the project. I haven't been at home much during the day and if you walked in the house, you could really tell. Today, will be cleaning day. The boys will be so excited :) I will try to keep up with my blog and work on that post about Lauren, again. Please comment and let us know what's up!

All about Aaron

Aaron is our ball of fire. He goes to the extreme in everything. He is SO loving. He is very particular and precise and loves a challenge. Puzzles are a big deal to him. He will work on one until he gets it put together all by himself. He is loving preschool one day and crying not to go the next. The not wanting to go just started before Thanksgiving. I think all of those hours spent at school are starting to get to him. We have had a few "fun" days when he gets to stay home and hang out with Mom. I wanted to be able to do that with him but I knew better than to start it at the beginning of school. If I would have done that, he would NEVER want to go or ALWAYS expect me to pick him up early. He says he likes everything at school except naptime. When he is at home, he likes to play with his brothers and he also likes to do things on his own. Today, he played with beads for hours after school. The other boys went outside with dad and Aaron worked on his fish made of beads. He is so pleasant and fun. I laugh all the time with the things that he says. He has just figured out that Lauren will be a mom when she grows up. He doesn't mind playing with her "girl" stuff either. He is a sweet boy but loves to get stuff started with his brothers so they will chase him or wrestle with him. Always fun when Aaron's around.

Ethan's Post

Ethan is now 6 years old and in Kindergarten. He does not love school. He simply tolerates it. He does a good job on his papers. I think this year he has had more of a problem with his peers. We have noticed that all of a sudden it REALLY matters if his hair is laying down or if there is milk on his mouth. He only cares about this sort of stuff on school mornings. I don't know if someone is picking on him or what. I would think that kind of thing wouldn't bother him. His brothers joke around with him all the time. He has several friends that he really loves to play with and looks forward to seeing them at school. The work does not excite him. I hope we can continue to encourage him about his work. We keep telling him that he should be a good friend so the others can learn from his example. We are praying for him in this area.
Ethan loves hanging out with his Dad. It doesn't matter what he is doing--he just wants to watch or be there with him. I love to look out the window and see him "helping" Thad with the 4-wheeler or whatever he may be working on. He also spends time with his little sister. She LOVES him and he is so sweet to her. If he feels like being rough or wrestling, he goes to his brothers. They have such a good time wrestling and running. He has enjoyed duck and deer hunting this year. He hasn't killed anything yet and doesn't really feel a need to--he just likes to go.
He learned to ride his bike while we were in Michigan. He got a bigger one for his birthday and rides it all of the time.

Update on Brendan

I have decided that I should take a little extra time to post on each one of the kids to let everyone know what is going on in their lives. Brendan gets to go first. He is in the 4th grade and loves it. He has a small class and they have a lot of fun. His favorite thing is the Accelerated Reading Program. He has set some personal goals of how many books/points he wants to read/accumulate. He is doing great at it. He really likes the whole points system and I like it too because I know that he is really understanding what he reads if he makes 90/100% on his tests.
He has 120 points so far which put him in the 8th place in the whole school (3rd-12th grades). I am so proud. Can you tell? He is reading every night when the little ones get into bed.
He has just gotten the expanders removed from his mouth. Yippee! We go on Tuesday to the orthodontist to see what kind of gear will be put into that mouth next.
He shot his first duck this year and is looking forward to going hunting with his dad during the Christmas holidays. He wants to go deer hunting too.
He is growing so fast. I can't believe he is 9! Time sure does fly. So I thought I would include some pictures on this post.

All the Madness!! All the Fun!!

We are so enjoying this holiday season. We are officially finished with all of the shopping :) Now we are planning on enjoying each other and all of the fun things to do. Today, we stayed home all day and made Christmas trees and candy and a big mess. It was so much fun. Tomorrow we will go to the Christmas musical at church. The boys only have two more days of school and two half days. They are looking forward to their Christmas parties at school. Brendan's class is donating to a family that lost their home to a fire instead of exchanging gifts. Ethan and Aaron's class will have a book exchange. They get so excited about it! We hope to make it to a movie this week. It has been quite a while since we've been to the theater. We will be celebrating Meme's birthday at the end of the week and going to see the Christmas lights. The kids look forward to these special things we do as a family. I love that part of Christmas. I am always surprised at how much they remember about the meaning of Christmas. We talk about the meaning behind the lights, trees and gifts and why we celebrate. They have learned alot from each other and they continue to teach me more each day. I am so thankful that in all of this madness and fun, they still know that all of the excitement is about the birth of Jesus!