Holding on to Summer!

It has been a good summer.  We have no travels to tell about, at least not as a family.  Most of our days haven't been filled with anything organized.  But it's been great and I'm not nearly ready for it to end!!

Ordinary days:  Most of our days we have been home doing a lot of reading, playing games, working for video games and then playing them, cooking, cleaning, playing outside, watching movies (especially some of my old favorites) and having lots and lots of play dates with friends old and new.  We have made many trips to the library and even more trips to the pool.  We've had friends and family over for dinner.  We've gone on bike rides and walks.

Special days:  We have gotten to go to friends' houses, sporting events, VBS, KNO game nights and had a few special visitors stay with us-- Matt's fellow soldier at Ft Lewis, Nate and Jeannie with her boys.

I have gotten dates with the kids, which I've never tried to make happen before.  I've also gotten "sleepovers" with each one on nights Matt is gone.  I have really loved the one-on-one time.

Gray went to a basketball camp and LOVED it.  He cannot get enough of shooting hoops.  Julia went to a princess dance camp and an art camp.  Joshua had an epic trip to Mimi and GrandGene's full of museums and Carowinds and lots of fun family time.  Gray is away right now getting his time in Rock Hill and loving it, though showing Mimi and GrandGene just how hard-headed he is!

Growing days:  Matt started his new job and is learning so much and working so hard.  Each of the kids has learned a little more about cooking.  Julia has always been interested in helping in the kitchen but Gray has been super enthusiastic and loved planning a meal from start to finish.  Joshua is usually reluctant to help but he enjoyed making pancakes Saturday with me just standing by to give advice while he did all the work.

Julia has been making progress with her reading lessons.  Joshua is learning more about patience and not getting everything you want as he waits for his leg to heal.  He has agreed to try swimming classes in the fall since basketball is probably not going to be an option for a few more years.

We've had some birds and the bees lessons with the kids (using the book "What's the Big Deal?"), which has gone really well b/c they are young enough to be curious, listen to us, and not roll their eyes in embarrassment!

We've been learning how to be more social and better conversationalists, as we are all the type to wait for people to speak to us.  I read a few books on the subject and have been sharing what I learned.  Julia did great the other day and reached out to an acquaintance at the pool after remembering what we talked about.  She continues to be the most social of the family.

I have taken up running...well, jogging really, which has definitely been a growing experience as I stink at it!  But I'm getting so much better and learning to enjoy getting out of the house alone for a little while.  I also started re-teaching myself to play the piano, which I really enjoy doing as well!

Future days:  There are just 2 1/2 weeks till school starts back and I'm not sure any of us are ready.  Well, maybe Julia.  She doesn't say too much about it but I think she's mostly looking forward to it.

Gray has loved being at home with few demands on him and we're wondering how it's going to go when school starts.  We had a phone consultation with a neurofeedback doctor in Chapel Hill that was very intriguing.  Her type of treatment is highly recommended by the Academy of Pediatrics, but highly expensive and not covered by insurance.  She says she'd look at an EEG of his brain each visit and figure out exactly where it isn't functioning well and be able to target that area.  It's supposed to last indefinitely, with maybe some maintenance visits here and there.  So we are weighing the cost as we try to figure out what's best for him.  Could be a busy fall with twice a week visits to the doctor.  Gray is also interested in playing flag football and then basketball, but we haven't decided yet.  It's a little crazy to thing of adding a bunch of activities when last year we had nothing extra!

Joshua will have swimming twice a week during September and then we can decide from there to continue or not.  A kind neighbor has been researching Perthes disease and helping us understand it a little better and it really seems like swimming will be very good for him.

Julia is going to do a little dance class with 3 of her friends and she can't wait.  She loves showing me her ballet moves at home.

Matt's schedule will become a little more manageable as he will finish up his orientation weeks where he sometimes has extra classes to take.  He's trying to figure out the best schedule to go with, since he can pick his own shifts.

And me?  Well I'm still supposed to be getting a job.  My best options haven't panned out yet and I've been reluctant to jump on finding something that I don't seem very suited for.  I think I just want to get through this big transition of not having any little ones at home anymore and starting this new school and these new activities.

And then there's the other big "if" for our family as we are still contemplating getting a dog.  We know a little more what type we need for Joshua's allergies, but they aren't the kind that you kind find just anywhere in a shelter.  Matt is very taken by the cute puppies, but most of "our" types are hundreds and hundreds of dollars and of course a lot of work, especially if I'm going to work!  So we wait.  I think one of my biggest life lessons of my adult life so far has been waiting.  The LORD is always at work and I must be patient.

In our last weeks of summer, we'll look forward to a visit from Amanda, get some tutoring done with KNO kids, have some more friends over, find out who our teachers are and get school supplies, celebrate our anniversary, and do all the other usual things.  It's going to fly and I'm going to try to enjoy each day!

The Big Guy

Well my motivation for blogging didn't last too long there, but I'm back to record some Joshua memories.  It's been quite a year for this boy--the Perthes diagnosis last fall (he's been on crutches since September!), moving to Nanny and Pa's and then to our new house, saying goodbye to the school he's been attending for 4 years, and now nearing his 10th birthday.  

Ten is really getting to me.  It just seems like his childhood is almost over and I know it's cliché, but it really seems like the blink of an eye!  I keep waiting for that sarcastic, sullen, annoyed tween phase to begin creeping in, but Joshua assures me that will never happen and though I know it's totally normal to go through it, I almost believe him.  He is just so sweet to me.  He barely ever says a rude word, he apologizes profusely when he disobeys, and he tells me he loves me all. the. time.  Even when I'm grumpy and don't deserve his kind words.  

 His sweetness extends to Julia, who loves to play with him, but fends off his attempts at affection.  It extends to Matt, though they relate to each other a little differently.  It extends to animals (stuffed or real) and little kids.



I only wish Gray got his share.  Sadly, the competition seems to always be there for these two, especially on Joshua's part.  I'm sure one day they will show their support for each other, but I so wish they wouldn't waste their years now fighting and trying to one up each other.

Besides playing with Gray and chasing Julia around, these days Joshua is very into sports--NC State and the Seahawks in particular.  He loves to watch sports, play sports video games, play sports outside, talk about sports.  His "go to" outfits is his all red NC State outfit, complete with tall stocks and his precious new tennis shoes that he keeps in a box and usually only brings out on Tuesdays.  His back up is all navy and lime green Seahawks attire.  The boy loves routines.

 He also loves any chance he can get to play with friends.  He is very good at making friends and being immediately at ease with playing with them, which is unusual given that he typically has to size up and warm up to things.  He never wants to be the center of attention, but usually has a good friend to have fun with wherever he goes--at his old school, in his new neighborhood, at KNO, at church, etc.  He loved bonding more with a boy from our small group during VBS this month.  And his VBS teacher loved him.  She kept telling me how good he was and yes, that is dependable Joshua when he is not with his siblings at least!

Joshua's other interests range from crocheting (short lived, though he recently mentioned wanting to pick it back up) to reading (he loves reading on his own, hearing Matt read Lord of the Rings, and even hearing me read Anne of Green Gables) to drawing to playing board games (current fav is Settlers of Catan) to swimming.  He's pretty naturally good at most anything he tries, like his Daddy.

He may be growing up, but some things never change.  He still loves his things.  He recently put his 50+ stuffed animals that stay on his bed into bags (still on his bed) for easy carrying in case of a fire.  He wanted to save his snowmen and snowballs in the freezer every time it snowed this winter.  He loves to take pictures of things to remember, like his lego creations--or tonight, his arm where he got blood taken, since I declined his request to save his dirty bandaid.

 Mr. Animal Lover has also continued to beg for a dog, especially once we found out there may be breeds he could tolerate in spite of his allergies.  He went through a phase of being committed to saving his money to buy one and even watched an infomercial on training a puppy for quite awhile.  We are still undecided about taking the plunge.

 What's next for our oldest child?  His latest xray showed he still has a long way to go with healing his leg, so we're trying to be more strict about his activities.  He's very relieved to be done with his crutches finally and that good news was enough to sustain him through the bad news of no basketball/team sports.  Today Matt took him to the doctor to start testing for food allergies in case that could be behind his autoimmune issues.  We won't find out for a week or so what the results are and may need to see an allergist to follow up.

He's looking forward to his new school, though a little sad to leave his Hillandale friends behind.  Three of his closest friends had birthday parties the last month of school so he had a lot of great times with them to finish off the year.  Thankfully, he has friends he'll know at the new school and we're still getting to know some of our neighbors his age too.  Think he will be just fine.

In the Middle

Life with Gray has been the usual lately.  Ups and downs--sometimes ups and downs in the same minute.  He can go from happy to sad or mad in the blink of an eye.  He continues to wow us with the things he thinks of.  And that's just the thoughts he tells us.  He's often sitting introspectively for a long time so who knows what else he may be have come up with that no one else would have thought.

He loves jokes.  He brought his little Army bear to me this morning and told me a joke he made up:  What did the bear with long arms says?  "I'm arm-y bear."  Well, I thought it was clever.

He loves to argue.  Never seen someone argue as much as he does.  A snapshot from last night at the baseball game:  He argued that the red marks on his shoulders in the areas his little tank top didn't cover were definitely not sunburn.  He argued that he wouldn't be cold at the baseball game with his little tank top, though it was going to get down to 60.  He argued that juniors come before freshmen in school.  He argued that if a fly ball is caught, no one else can score.  He argued that the runner was not out because he didn't see the tag.  We laughed as we watched State's coach chew out an umpire, thinking, "Maybe baseball really could be Gray's thing!"  He does end up in a blow up argument about nearly every sport-related game he plays.  Or maybe he'll be a lawyer.  We know one thing at least--debate team, here we come!

Gray is really into math lately.  He loves just talking about numbers.  He saw a package labeled 2 ft and he wanted to tell me it was 24 inches.  At the game he kept wanting to talk about how many minutes it had been going on or how many minutes till it would be a 3 hour game.  He likes to tell us exactly what time he woke up in the morning.  He loves keeping score for a board game.  And he is pretty good at calculating things in his head.

He continues to do lots of against the grain things.  He ate a clover on St Patrick's day ("It tastes like spinach.") and a dead bug as well ("Jordan told me to.  I wanted to because I thought it would taste good and it did!")  He often seems to enjoy getting a reaction from others by being different.

He makes us laugh.  When discussing dog breeds and identifying several crossbreeds, we came to a 'cockapoo'.  Gray says it's a cross between a cockroach and a poodle.  I once told Gray to take his hands out of his pants and he said, "Ok, my hands are out of my pants!"  He had stuck his arms though his shorts so his hands would stick out of the bottom.  One day Julia drew a picture of a shark and Pa put a "No Swimming" sign in the background.  Gray looked at it and matter-of-factly said, "The shark will die."

Gray is still obsessed with sports.  Loves playing them, especially basketball.  Loves watching them--he was into every minute of the 4 hour game last night.  Even enjoys watching golf on tv.  Loves reading about them.  And sharing all sorts of trivia with anyone who will listen.  Reminds me of a certain grandfather of his in that respect. :)

He's still struggling to pay attention at school and the psychiatrist says he is ADHD.  So far, the medicine we're trying doesn't seem to make a difference, but a friend of mine said it took while for her daughter.  We're ok if it doesn't work, but we want to give it a try.  I don't get much feedback from his teacher, but his speech teacher loves to talk to me about him.  He stopped me the other morning and said that they were making rockets the other day and Gray was sooo excited.  He said it was great to see him enthusiastic, but hard to keep him focused, which reminds him so much of his son.  Then he said of Gray, "He's wonderful.  He really is."  Really thankful for this encouraging voice in Gray's life.

We love our Gray.  No one like him.  I pray we'll be able to develop his unique abilities well and help him with the things that are challenging.  Looking forward to seeing him be all that God created him to be!

Happy Mother's Day to Mama

Well I'm not sure I can top the first Mother's Day gift I received this year.  Last week, Gray presented me with an early Mother's Day card.  I asked did he not want to wait till actual Mother's Day to give it to me, but he reminded me on the card it specifies that it is an early Mother's Day card.  So I read it and was treated with this special sentiment:

Knock, Knock
Who's there?
Honeybee.
Honeybee who?
Honey bee a dear and get me a soda.

Poetic, huh?  I think that sums up Gray's loving feelings for his Mommy pretty well.

It's also difficult to describe the appreciation I felt a few Fridays ago at Joshua's Econopolis where I quietly suggested he "buy" me a pair of earrings from a classmate with his fake money for Mother's Day.  He reluctantly agreed.  Then he heard the price tag:  $8.  He said never mind and headed to his desk.  He ended up getting the girl down to $5, at which point he picked out a pair, marched over and said, "Here," shoving them in my hand.  I gave them back and said he had to wait till Mother's Day.  We'll see if he has held on to them.

So how do I honor my mother in the example of my sons?  Well I saw on facebook that a woman had made a list of the ways she was like her mom and encouraged others to do the same.

So here is my list:

-We don't like crowds.
-We love flowers.
-Our happy place is a crafty project while watching a movie.
-Cooking isn't our favorite.
-We have a soft place for the kids that are overlooked or always in trouble.
-We are easily overwhelmed.
-We are sensitive.
-We highly value books.
-We don't like loud noises.
-We enjoy painting...when we are in the right mood.
-We are directionally challenged.
-We aren't big city people.
-We like a good bargain.
-We love the old, old movies.
-Being the center of attention is not our thing.
-We like a good board game.
-We are kind of home-bodies.
-Driving is not our forte.
-We enjoy bright colors.
-Craft stores are our favorites.
-We love children.
-We like things that match.
-We are a little scatter-brained.

What can I say?  I am my mother's daughter, and I'm good with that.  I love you, Mama!  Happy Mother's Day!!

Sweet and Spicy

That's still our Julia!

She loves playing with the boys but boy will she scream at them.  She makes up games that usually get out of control and end with her hitting them, yelling, running in her room and slamming the door, or all of the above!  She also gets very mad and me and Matt several times a day, usually for things like not hearing her when she was talking and asking her to repeat it.  Yeah.

But the sweet side?  Oh my goodness- that girl's heart!  She HATES for anyone to be upset.  This little lady will crank out a hand-drawn card in 2 seconds flat if anyone is mad, sad, fell off a bike, etc. She is just so sensitive and attuned to everyone's feelings.

And you hear it's good to talk about your feelings, right?  Well she's got that down.  And more.  Example goes something like this:  "Well the thing is that I like my friends but it's just that sometimes they all want to sit beside me and they say, 'I want to sit beside Julia!  I want to sit beside Julia!' and I want to spend time with all of my friends but I just can't sit beside all of them and sometimes I just want to sit beside Dhilan but all my friends want to sit beside me and I like them but I just don't like when they do that and they like me but it's just hard when they all want to sit beside me because the thing is..." and on and on.  You get the picture.

She can go deep too.  Yesterday in the car, some of her thoughts, which she freely shared in monologue when I told her I was losing my voice and would just listen, were these:

"I'm going to give you and Daddy a present, but it's not going to be like a card or a toy or a movie.  It's going to be loving you."

"So God gives us gifts, but they aren't like cards.  It's like the Holy Spirit."

Her favorite things:  My Little Pony (the only thing she will ever pick to watch on tv), her music (she loves to go in her room, put in a cd and rock out...or twirl like a ballerina), friends (she does not know I exist when she's with little girls), drawing, playing in her room, eating snacks, hearing stories of when they were little (and retelling them to anyone that will listen), playing with grandparents, her stuffed animals, wearing dresses, smelling her little string of a night-night, praying for our sponsored kids.

She is doing awesome with reading.  She also loves to play the spelling game, which means I tell her to spell a word and she does.  Or sometimes she tells herself to spell a word and then does.  She says all the time, "Well I just need to practice my letters and numbers."  It is a whole different world from the boys!

She is my shopping partner extraordinaire.  Sure, she gets tired and whiny when we're on our 4th store, but going to one or two places she is great.  She loves to help me pick out things while giving a running commentary in a grown-up sounding voice like, "Well, this might be nice!" and "Well, let's not get that this time.  How about you can get it the next time?"

A few months ago, the bedwetting alarm worked it's magic and we are a pull-up free house!  She was very good about it and so sweet when I'd get up with her.  I would be half awake and she would be giving me hugs and saying she loved me.

Other random quotes:

"I hope I NEVER forget not to touch a dead bat."

"I shouldn't have written 'Daddy' on Daddy's valentine because I might forget which Daddy it's for."

"Mommy!! Gray is saying something inappropriate!!"

"Mama, when can I take my eye drops out of my ear?" (meant the cotton balls holding in the ear drops)

"Look at us looking like chickmunks!" (using the photo booth program on my computer)

"No I don't mean any of that!  It's like the RAIN pedals!" (meant puddles)

"It is familiar that you can dribble a basketball and not a football." (she has her own meaning of the word familiar)

"I feel jealous because Dhilan wanted me to play with him earlier and I said no but now I wish I did.  Anyway he's a friend and I don't want to let a friend down."

"My heart is broken because I am sad to leave Mimi."

"If they are real, aliens probably don't live here in Hillsborough...probably like in Durham at other people's houses."

So far this year...

Well I love this blog, but lately I have loved the idea of it more than the actual writing of it!  But things are starting to settle down around here so I thought I'd try to get down a little of the first 4 months of this year.

2015 began with us getting settled back in at Cindy and Barnette's after our visit to Rock Hill for Christmas.  We had a Jen Hatmaker HGTV marathon and then watched a comedy show to bring in the New Year with Matt's parents.  I'll let you decide which of those Matt enjoyed the most.:)

Life in Hillsborough was good.  Cindy and Barnette were very gracious to let us bring our loud, messy family to disrupt their order!  It was nice having more adults to visit with, grandparents to share some of the playing with and listening to the kiddos, etc.  With the cold and snowy weather, I spent a lot of time by the fire crocheting things for our new house.

We played games.

Did a little working out.

Went to museums and a farm.

We were probably a bit spoiled, except for Matt, who remained busily finishing up his last semester.  We did enjoy taking lots of walks and of course checking on the new house progress, which came to a bit of a screeching halt during the bad weather days.  And the kids (and adults) had a great time sledding and playing in the snow on our many canceled school days!

Highlights of January:
-I had a fun breakfast out with the ladies from my small group.  I think we could have sat and talked all day, which is just not something I get to do often these days.  I have really enjoyed being part of that group and it has helped CGS feel more like our church again.  I also had a dinner with the rest of the ACT leadership team.  We had gotten busy and didn't really know where to go with the group.  It had been wonderful to educate ourselves and our families on the issues we explored but we weren't getting many new folks and at this meeting we decided we'd just find things to do with existing organizations and share those ideas with everyone.  In the end, it has kind of fizzled out and that's okay.  It served it's purpose among our group of friends and I think we do live differently now that we know what we know.  But most of my volunteer energy is being poured into Kids' Night Out stuff, so I am happy to have my "thing" and that be enough for now.

-Joshua and Matt got to go with a boys' group from church to do some service in the church and then rock climb.  Julia got to go to her twin friends' Anna and Sage's superhero birthday party.  She chose to be spiderman and was adorable.  Joshua reconnected through skype with his friend Dvir from Israel who moved here for their first grade year.

-Matt and Todd added Stacy and Amy to the group of gym owners, which relieved me of my duties as financial person and gave Matt mostly the job of programming workouts while others worried with the other aspects.

Highlights of February:
-We went to some friends' house for the Super Bowl.  The boys were so into the game, though Joshua was really upset at the loss.  The next day when he got in the car and I asked how his day was, he answered with, "He should not have thrown that pass!!!"  I still don't know that he's over it!

-Matt and I went to a very fun "Newlywed Game" shepherding group party.  We ended up winning the game by matching our answers to questions like, "What percent would your wife say you do of the housework?" (answer- 10%!!) or "When is a memory your husband has of you that he won't ever forget?" (answer- when our kids were born) or "What quality would your wife say she most values about you?" (answer-reliability)  So many laughs we had that night.  Can't wait to do it again next year!

-Matt and I went to several Duke games.  The first couple of games I was silently pulling against Duke (I'm an underdog kind of girl), but by the end they had grown on me.  The UNC game went into overtime and was super fun to watch.  Crazy loud!

-We all went to the Family and Friends Day at the nursing school.  The kids loved it more than I thought.  Joshua actually really enjoyed a lecture on obesity he went to with the adults.

-We visited Rock Hill and celebrated Amanda, Maddox, Sawyer, Carly, and Graham's birthdays, ninja turtle style.  Kids had tons of fun together as always.  The boys went early because Julia threw up.

-Joshua got another xray and we found out he is progressing but slowly.  We were told to stay the course, which was good news and bad news.  Joshua has been on crutches at school since September and won't have another xray till June, so he'll finish the year still not being able to do a lot of the things he wants to do.

Highlights of March:
-Matt started his preceptorship at Duke Regional.  14 twelve hour shifts, that usually ran much longer.  It was a big adjustment for him to be on his feet that long and figuring out sleeping when he had a night shift.

-Julia got to go spend the weekend in Rock Hill by herself.  She was a little hesitant to say goodbye to me, had a great time, and cried almost the whole hour and 15 minutes back home from our meeting place.  She is a big crier with goodbyes!

-Gray had his birthday which went well.  He had several boys over to play basketball, a little video games, eat pizza, and just hang out.  He had lots of fun and it was nice and laid back!

-Julia got to have a few playdates with her friend Addie and little sister Ava (and I got to visit with her mom).  She just cannot get enough of her little girl friends, though preschool has expanded her horizons to boys as her friends too.  My friend Rebecca's little boy Dhilan is a fav.  We went to their house for lunch and Dhilan exclaimed, "Julia's here!  Oh yeah, baby!"  Another day she went over to play and he asked her to snuggle with him while they watched a movie, to which she gave him a quizzical look and then said, "ok".  I found them huddled on one of the couch when I picked her up. So sweet!

-Gray got glasses!  We knew that was coming, but weren't quite prepared for the cuteness.  Of course he forgets to wear them about 50% of the time:)

-The kids and I went to Rock Hill for Spring Break.  We dyed eggs, visited with Constance, Oli, Cheryl, and Grandmama, played outside, celebrated Daddy's birthday, and went to Amanda's.

Highlights of April:
-We had a really nice Easter day going to church and then a lunch and egg hunt with our shepherding group.  The kids really enjoy friend time and I thought it was nice to share a holiday with friends, which we haven't really done since the army days.

-We moved!  I spent a few weeks moving stuff myself while Matt was busy with school and then he finally gave the word that he had time to help with the big stuff so away we went.  I told myself I would not get caught up in getting settled and be so obsessive(we're going to be here a long time I hope, so it's okay if it takes a few months to get unpacked, right?).  That idea went right out the window and, with my mom's help, everything was unpacked within the first week and here we are at almost 3 weeks and pretty much good to go.  Sure there is garage organizing to do, and a pile of books to be put away in the area I call "around the corner" (which is probably why it's not done yet!), but mostly we just have a few things here and there that most folks have on their to do list even when they haven't just moved in.  I think it went okay, though.  I didn't take many breaks, but it's good to be done and I even picked up a book to read the other night!  We love the new house.  Can't even believe how nice it is.  We have so much space, though some rooms are smaller like the kids' bedrooms.  We have lots of neat spaces to go-- a chair fits in our bedroom, we have a screened porch, front porch, and a deck, there's a window seat, a spare bedroom, and a little nook upstairs ("around the corner").  Matt has his beloved study.  It's really just the nicest house for us and I hope we use it well!

-Gray had a friend's birthday party at the museum and I helped at his Science Day at school.  He sang in a music program at school one night.  I went on Joshua's field trip to the museum and helped with his Econopolis at school (a fun day of kids running their own little stores and buying from others with fake money they had been earning).  Joshua got to go to a neighborhood friend's birthday party at the bowling alley.

-Matt finished his preceptorship and school work.  He was so happy to be done and has really enjoyed having so much free time.  And I would definitely have to adjust my answer to that Newlywed Game question about helping around the house.  No more 10%!  It's nice to have help with things like putting the kids to bed and the handyman jobs I fumble through.  He also got a job at UNC pretty easily, which we were very proud about!  He's so enjoying his break but feeling good about his new job too I think.

-Julia got registered for kindergarten!  She was happy to be there and did well not being too shy--even made a new friend.  I loved seeing the many KNO kids that go there.  Looking forward to this change, though we will miss Hillandale too.

May: 
Now it is suddenly May and it's hard to believe the time has flown by so quickly.  We are spending a lot of time outside these days- gardening, playing basketball, relearning bike riding after not having them for 6 months.

We attended our neighborhood yard sale Saturday and it was good to meet many of our neighbors, who were very friendly.  There are lots of boys around that we hope to get together with our boys!  I also could walk down and visit with some of the friends I've had for years.  Love being able to see them so easily.  Gray may have had the best time of all at the yard sale.  He said God answered his prayer that he would have something to go to like Joshua's Econopolis.  He had been saving his money and he was wheeling and dealing, buying everything from stuffed animals to a baseball helmet and metal bat.  He and I even dropped Julia and Joshua off at our house and went to more houses because he was so into it.

This week we are looking forward to celebrating Matt's graduation and Mother's Day with both sets of our parents.  I got Matt the gift of Brad Paisley tickets for the following weekend with several other couples.  Yes, Jeannie, I did finally tell him via a puzzle of Brad Paisley's face as you suggested.  He was not nearly as amused with it as he should have been!  But he's excited about the concert.

Julia and I will finish up with preschool this month.  It's been a huge blessing to be a part of it.  My friend Rebecca has planned and taught everything while I have assisted and subbed on occasion.  The kids need it so much and I'm very thankful these few were able to attend.  We will also do our last tutoring session next week until end of summer, but will continue to do KNO events over the summer.

School will be over before we know it and we don't have a whole lot of summer plans.  Matt will start his job in early July, so we're kind of waiting to see how that goes.  It's been an eventful year and I'm looking forward to slowing down and everyone having more time to enjoy being together.  With me looking for a job in the fall and Julia starting kindergarten, there will be plenty of time ahead to be busy!

Birthday Fun!

A lot has happened in the last month.  We moved out of our house the week before Christmas, which was pretty exhausting.  We moved in with Barnette and Cindy, which went well, but took time to get all our stuff organized and settled.  We headed to Fort Mill to celebrate Christmas, which was a fun whirlwind as usual.  And we came back home and got ready to celebrate Julia's 5th birthday.

In all the excitement of the move and Christmas and travel, I hadn't had the mental capacity to plan a big party for Julia, but she was happy to do a little tea party with the cousins and go out to dinner that night.  All was going smoothly till we got the call that the cousins had come down with the flu.  Julia was napping so I didn't have to break the news to her yet and decided to try to get some friends to come over and fill in for the cousins.  By the time she woke up, I had about 5 kids ready to party and she was fine with the change of plans.  Then as I fixed supper and made her cake, I heard Matt comment on one of Julia's eyes being red.  Sure enough, it was red and had some yellow stuff around it so we very sadly told the friends we probably couldn't have the party.  Julia said, "This is going to be the worstest birthday ever!"  But we held out a slight hope that maybe it wasn't pink eye and decided to wait and see in the morning.

This morning was dark and dreary and we slept in a bit.  When I made it up to see Julia about 8, her eye looked almost normal.  I was excited, but realized we had a party to plan for that morning, which I had done very little to prepare for!  And Julia reminded me that she had wanted egg and bacon muffins for breakfast, which I had forgotten and not made ahead of time.  So Barnette helped me make breakfast and Cindy and I scrambled to get the party food ready and all worked out just fine.

Before the party, Matt came home with balloons and we let Julia open her gifts from us--a sticker book, Merida and her mom dolls, and a big Elsa that sings, which Matt had picked out.  Well we have heard "Let it go!" more times than we can count today, but Julia was very happy with her new little friend.  She brought Elsa out to eat, thinking that "people" would want to see and hear her.  We did hear our waitress singing "Let it go" as she walked back to the kitchen.

Julia had a variety of friends come to her party--a friend from Sunday School and her siblings, a friend from small group, a friend she took ballet with and her sister, and the twin girls of my friend that does KNO with me.  It was a good group and the girls enjoyed playing with princess dolls for the first hour.

Then we ate and played some more.  The brothers wreaked a little havoc on the party when they started hiding from the girls, which caused the girls to run through the house chasing them.  Julia got upset and said the girls were doing things to hurt the brothers and she did not like that!  She loves those brothers.  One friend of mine and her daughters stayed late and Julia seemed happiest then, having someone to play with and a little bit of calm.  Earlier I found her sitting in a chair smelling her night-night, which must mean she felt a little overwhelmed.

She certainly felt overwhelmed with the attention she got at cake time.  She did not want to blow out those candles!  I gave her several options--someone blow them out with her, her blow them out, someone do it for her--and she wanted someone to do it for her.  I had plenty of volunteers for that job!

At the end of the day, she said her favorite part of her party was the dessert!  We had a nice dinner out and she opened a few more presents from family and headed to bed.