4th of July

Look at this! I'm posting about a holiday in the month it actually occurred -- amazing!

Happy 4th of July!

We had a fun 4th of July in Topeka. (I must admit that Wednesday is my least favorite day for this holiday to fall on since we worked the day before and day after.) Anyway, we started the morning visiting our friends from Texas. We don't get to see them nearly enough!

You try getting 5 kids to look at the camera and smile.

W loved this silly bandana. He got it the day before at school and wore it all day.

so sweet!

There's a lot of cheese in this picture! But I love seeing these two dad with their growing families :)

Then we went swimming and had lunch with J's family. The older kids (and by kids, I mean adults, too) did fireworks that night. EK was scared of the noise and Patrick was asleep so I missed the show, but Will sure enjoyed himself!

Grandpa & Will during the afternoon fireworks

Cousins

Patrick & Aubrey

Will's coordination has gotten much better so he & Nathan had a great time playing the Wii.

Mother's Day & Father's Day

It's taken me so long to do a Mother's Day post, I just decided to combine Mother's & Father's Days. We spent a wonderful, relaxing Mother's Day at home. The kids were so excited to bring me breakfast in bed (read: they loved getting stuff from the bakery and having a picnic on my bedroom floor). It was really cute :)
Below are the cards the kids made me at school. Totally priceless...and hilarious - I don't know who the mother they talk about is! It is certainly not me who likes to cook and clean!

A note on "she looks at the computer": as best I can tell, she's thinking of when we look at pictures on the computer. I am really never on the computer when she's awake otherwise!

I am so thankful that their teachers are creative and take time to do this with every child. It's awesome!

This past weekend we celebrated Father's Day with some much-needed family time at home. The kids' cards for Justin are below.

Easter 2012

We had our egg hunt at church the weekend before church. Will & Elle loved it and Patrick slept pretty much the whole time. Couldn't have planned it better :)

The big kids and I dyed eggs. They loved it.

Then on Easter day, we went to early mass (and actually arrived early!!). The Easter Bunny came while we were at church (magic, I know) and then we headed to mom's for the day. There was more egg hunting there and the Easter Bunny brought kites so they tried them out. Weather was great - kids were great - lovely day.

P in outfit #1. Blowout at church necessitated outfit #2 before going to Grandma's.

Tinkerbell and my knight in shining armor

If nothing else, my kids get good use out of their costumes each year!
First was the Halloween parade at J's office. They both have trick-or-treating down pat this year and had a blast! Their bags were so heavy with candy afterwards that they were dragging on the ground.

The lobby of each floor had spooky decorations.

I love their expressions in this one!

Can we go now?

And, they're off!

Checking out their loot

 Then we had Halloween brunch (the day before Halloween) with Grammy & Grandpa.

They got to decorate pumpkins

And have yummy treats!

On Halloween, they got to wear their costumes to school and have a party. I LOVE this pictures of them!

 Then we had trick-or-treating in our neighborhood on Halloween night. Aunt Casie came over to help. We went to 9-10 houses on our block and called it good. As in the past, the highlight is handing out candy to the other kids who come to the door.

waiting for trick-or-treaters

Happy, happy girl!

Shoving a whole pb cup in her mouth...just like her mama!

Look at all that candy!

And the silliness begins

We had beautiful weather and lots of fun. Incidentally, I also had a doctor's appointment on Halloween. All is checking out great. Baby boy is still big. We discussed moving my due date up to Feb. 12. However, I told her I wasn't too concerned about the due date. My kids never seem to make it to that point anyway. I know we'll have a c-section, so we'll schedule a date and if he makes it until then, great. If not, he'll come when he's ready. Now it's time for getting the house (and ourselves!) ready for this new baby and upcoming holidays. Lots to do, but I really do love this time of year.