June 1-4

Hi! It's been a while, huh? I have like 2 weeks worth of pic-a-day's to catch up on. I'm not gonna do it all at once. We have been crazy busy, I can't even believe it. Here is a list of some of our projects and things that have been keeping us busy:

*painting the house
*remodeling one bedroom
*Sage's birthday - my first "kid party"!
*Alyssa's cheer competition
*end of the school year - papers, awards ceremonies, parties, etc.
*camping with our church family

There is much more coming up this month! We are still working on the first two on that list, and we have many more activities to come this month.

6.1.11 - trying to get 4 kids to pose for a picture

6.3.11 - Sage's birthday party

As I said before, this was my first "kid party." I have never had any desire to throw all-out birthday parties for my kids. I don't know why. I like having adult parties, but they're easy. All you have to do is have lots of food and drinks, and clean your house. For kid parties you also have to PLAN ACTIVITIES! I'm just not good at that. For Alyssa's birthday parties in the past we've done easy things like roller skating, or a water park - something that provides the entertainment so I don't have to! So, I tried to come up with easy activities - I thought water games would be perfect. We had water balloons, a slip 'n slide, a couple funky sprinklers. I ordered an awesome cake from a friend who does awesome cakes, and I got Little Cesar's pizza. I didn't do party favors or send the kids home with bags of candy and crappy toys. I didn't do a pinata, or any kind of craft or anything that took a lot of prep time (the water balloons took up the most time to prepare, and Derrick did that). But holy cow, even with easy low-prep activities and food, that party totally kicked my butt. I spent all day getting ready for it, and all evening cleaning up, and I was totally frazzled and exhausted by the end of it. Everything went well, the kids had fun, and most important of all, Sage was happy and had a really great time.All 7 birthdays in our family are between April and October, so this is a busy season. The boys aren't old enough to know better yet, but in a few years... oh boy.

6.4.11 - Alyssa's cheer competition

Alyssa was on a Young Champions cheer leading team this past semester. She had a  really fun time, and their team took 2nd place in the competition! We were really proud of them (and her), and even though it was hot and steamy in the Goshen College rec center, it was actually a lot of fun to watch the teams compete.

We went camping this past weekend, and I have some really great pics of the kids on the beach, but... I want to do some editing, and I want to get caught up, so you'll have to wait a bit to see them. Ha ha, tease.