talk about stress.....

I couldn't take it anymore, I had to go inside....

This morning when I walked the kids across the street to school we saw the CUTEST thing! There was a mama bird and FOUR cute baby birds in the driveway. She would run a little and they would follow. She would go a little more and they would, too. All the while she is chirping and they copy her. I think she got nervous when we came out, poor dear. One of her babies ran inbetween the houses and one ran ACROSS THE DANG STREET! I was freaking out. She was, too. The chirping proved it. It almost sounded like psycho bird marco polo. You can just imagine her yelling, "GET YOUR BUTT BACK OVER HERE THIS INSTANT MISTER OR NO WORMS FOR DINNER FOR YOU!!!!!!!!!" I sympathised with her, ever had your kids run away from you at walmart or in a parking lot? She chirped from the yard and the baby across the street would chirp and run a little in one direction. She would chirp again and he would chirp and run a different direction. She flew across the street and started digging in this hole. Looking back, I wonder if it is her nest or something. Soon after she did this another bird starts trying to help herd the baby back to mom who is now back with the other babies trying to get them under control. Hmm, I bet that other bird is the father and he was sleeping through all the chaos, letting mother try to take care of four babies alone. Typical. I am watching all this just wanting to run over there and pick up the confused baby, but I refrain. How will he ever learn. So, there isn't much traffic at the time I bring my kids across, but there are a few cars coming here and there and this poor little guy is stuck across the street. She keeps trying to get him to cross the street and here comes a car. I wanted to scream at the cars and warn them about the poor stranded baby bird and the frantic momma bird, but I didn't. I just covered my face and hoped for the best. The other baby birds were following mom right by the curb and I could tell they got scared when a car came by. The mother finally got all the babies underneath her. The mom and dad birds were working together to try to get the one baby safe. She chirped from one side of the street and dad was on the same side as the baby and he would chirp and they finally got the baby over to mom. I think he learned his lesson. He went straight under her wing. I bet he is grounded. I am SO glad they are all together, but I hope they stay put for a while because the morning rush to school is about to happen. I think I will go check on them in a little bit. I hope I don't see them. I hope they are safe somewhere. Here is a picture of the mom with the 4 babies under her. I wanted to get a picture of the babies out, but there was no way I was going to disturb them and risk another fiasco. As I was slowly walking towards her, she started chirping loudly at me. If I could understand her she would probably be saying, "Lady, please get the crap away from me, I can't take any more stress right now." I wasn't even that close yet. I stayed back pretty far and then zoomed as far as my camera would go and I still had to majorly crop the picture so you can see the babies and you still can't see them well.



I just went outside and they were in my yard! I scared them. Oops. Must be some good worms in my yard. Here are some pics... (check out the long legs on those babies!)





Here is a video. Ignore me on there and listen for the little "beeps" the mom makes. Sorry for the shaky camera, I obviously can't walk and film at the same time even when I am trying to hold it steady LOL!



I could watch them all day, but I better keep an eye on my own little chickies.

I love this girl!

I know whoever reads this is probably sick of me saying over and over how perfect my baby is, but I can't help say it again! She is the most perfect baby anyone could ever hope for. She has the sweetest personality, she is patient and easy going, and is she ever cute as can be! Every second I am not playing with her or holding her or nursing her I feel like I am missing out. Maybe it is because she is the last baby, who knows, but I am totally smitten by her. Isn't she cute in the headband I crocheted? The boutique I am working on getting my hats in wanted me to try a headband and this was my first attempt. I still have a few things to work out, but I think it is pretty cute. Well, Heidi could be wearing a walmart sack and still be cute so maybe it is just her... :)

Baby toes taste good!

I love Heidi's toes and so does she! This is her new favorite past time, eating her toes LOL! She is getting so big, almost 6 months! Gosh, where does the time go???

AFV material???

We love to watch AFV every Sunday night as a family and we always wish we had a video to send to the show. So I am trying to capture the right thing on video to try to win some money, or even just having it on the show would be cool. Megan asked me what Heidi's food tasted like and I told her I would give her a dollar if she tasted it. She agreed so I ran to get my camera just in case it ended up being AFV worthy. Then Ethan wanted a dollar, too, so we had him do it. I was feeding Heidi prunes and she made the awfullest (is that a word?) face and I turned on the camera and she didn't make the face again, but it was still funny. Are any of these worthy of AFV?

Megan



Ethan



Heidi



I love it when Heidi sucks on her lip. Christian didn't want to participate... too bad.

Easter Celebration

This is my 100th post, wow! It will be a good one...

Today is Easter and what a wonderful reason to celebrate! We of course had a visit from the Easter bunny and had an egg hunt and all of the fun activities, but my favorite part was talking about Christ and the resurrection. We had a lesson this morning about the last supper, Garden of Gethsemane, the betrayal, the crucifixion, the burial, and the resurrection of Christ using the Gospel Art Picture Kit (love that). After the picture of the burial, we went into the kitchen and made resurrection rolls. It is so neat. Here is what we did...

Everyone got half of a large marshmallow. It represents Jesus.


Dip it in melted butter. This represents annointing Jesus in oils.




Then you roll it in cinnamon sugar. This represents the spices put on Christ's body.




Place the marshmallow on a crescent roll and wrap it up, sealing the edges well. This represents the linens wrapped arounf Christ.




Place in oven. Represents the tomb.


When they are done baking, open one up. It is hollow. The marshmallow is gone. Christ has risen!


A yummy breakfast with a very important lesson!


Here is a slide show of our other Easter festivities.

Heidi had her first Easter bunny.

Here is a video....


My four beautiful kids all dressed up :)

Happy Birthday Nanny!!!

I tried forever to load a video on here and it never worked, so I had to use you tube again. We hope you had a wonderful birthday, Nanny!

It's Official

We are moving.


Again.


I can't believe it. But, we go where we are told to go. This time to the Ft Worth area. I hope this time we can stay more than 2 years. Jared works in the oil field and he is usually gone a lot and this move will mean he gets to be home at nights and on the weekends. A life we have never known as a married couple. He will be there every Sunday for church. I think that is the best part about it for me. He can be involved in sports and other activities with all the kids. I can't tell you how many things we have missed out on because he is gone and I just can't bring myself to take all the kids by myself. The bad part is selling a house in this market. I am slightly worried about it. Only slightly because I have a great house in a great location and we are pricing to sell. I hope our house is the answer to someone's prayers and they will be the answer to mine! I am sad to leave this place, I really feel at home here and it is a beautiful place to live. I love it. I love my friends here most of all and it will be so hard to leave them. I really hope they stay friends with me and come visit, I will only be about 2.5 hours away. I am sad for the kids and the friends they leave behind as well. Especially Megan. She is in the best little activity day girls group ever and they are all such good, sweet girls. She will be in her 4th elementary school next year. She seems good at adjusting to each move. It helps that this time we are going to an area we already have some friends. That eases things somewhat. I am excited to have Jared home more and all the blessings (and frustrations) that brings and I know the kids will benefit greatly from this. So, please keep us in your thoughts and hope our house sells quickly so we can be a complete family again and I can be done with being a part time single mom.

April Fool's Fun

I love jokes. And I love April Fool's Day. I got my kids good a couple years ago by freezing their cereal. It was awesome. I haven't really done anything since and I wanted to do something this year. I have been looking up ideas for about a week and all I could find were food tricks and I wasn't sure I wanted to do that. Then the day before April 1st was hard and that night Heidi kept me up all night, so yesterday morning I wasn't up to fooling anyone. The day went on and no one pranked me and I pranked no one. Then I talked to Karalee and she told me all the fun things she was doing to her kids and I couldn't let the day be wasted. So I set out to get my kids. First I short sheeted Megan's bed. For those of you that don't know what that is (I didn't) it is where you get the top sheet and tuck the bottom of it under the mattress at the head of the bed, smooth the sheet down and then fold it back up so that it looks normal and when they get in bed there is no where for their legs to go because the fold it there. So funny. I was too lazy to do the boys' beds, I didn't think they would get it anyway, maybe next year. Then I sewed the bottom of one of their pajama pants leg shut. When I got the boys out of the bath, I had Megan get in the shower right away so she wouldn't hear what happened to Ethan's pajamas. It was so funny watching Ethan try to figure out why he couldn't get his shorts on!!! I was recording it all, but you can't see much because Christian was getting right in front saying cheese a million times. Then I heard the water turn off and I knew Megan was about to find my surprise. I sat on the couch where the bathroom door is visible and I started recording. I wanted to capture what happened when she came out to show me the pants since I obviously can't record her dressing for 2 reasons, one being she is 8 and I can't show her dressing on the internet and two she would totally know something was up. So I hear her make a noise and I knew she had discovered my prank. It took a couple minutes for her to come out so I started interview Christian so the video would not just be of a door LOL. She came out and walked up to me and here is the video of it... Ethan first and then megan under it...





After Megan got dressed for bed she must have gotten in bed and discovered her sheets were wrong. She came out and sat down in the chair next to me and said, "Mom, there is something wrong with my bed." I started laughing and asked her what was wrong, she said the sheets were messed up. I laughed so hard and I could see the recognition in her face. She yelled, YOU DID THIS TO ME! I said yep! She laughed and then said, "Hmmmm, I wonder what I am going to do to you?" LOL!! It was a fun April Fool's Day.