Phil and I were married eight years ago today. How are we celebrating? He'll probably spend the evening studying in his dorm room, and I'll probably enjoy grilled cheese with the kids tonight. Yesterday his parents celebrated their 47th wedding anniversary.
God has blessed me with yet another opportunity to fly up to see Phil this weekend!
When we were up in Washington, we visited with the Van Der Meersche family. I taught Chelsea and Mallory six years ago. I'm so glad that our families have kept in touch! Their mom, Wendy, is a dear friend of mine. We have much in common. It started with Starbucks and Trading Spaces. Now we enjoy laughing about episodes of Monk over the phone, and best of all, we each have a set of twin girls!
There was a fire across the road from our driveway this afternoon. The kids loved watching the 3 helicopters and the 3 air tankers fly overhead. Caleb especially liked the helicopter with the yellow bucket. The smell of smoke fills our house tonight, and we can still see bits of orange glow scattered along the hillside. This was a good one, Phil! You would have loved to see the kids out there taking pictures, eating popsicles and waving to the helicopters.
Thanks to all for the cards, gifts, phone calls and emails yesterday. I am very blessed to have such sweet friends and a loving family. Corinne helped my kids bake a cake...so sweet! They frosted it themselves. I wish I would have taken a picture of the finished product. They dug out sections off the top while frosting it. One thing that made my day was a card that I got from my Aunt in Arkansas. She added an old photo of me and Emily. Anyone remember "feathered" hair? I had forgotten about it--or blocked it from my memory--until yesterday!
The kids frosted school bus cookies last night after dinner. My friend Sandi gave me a great kit with four cookies, yellow frosting and candy sprinkles. They mostly enjoyed licking the frosting off of their cookies!
Today was the last day of Vacation Bible School at our church. Jared, Caleb and another little girl accummulated the most points (stickers) this week, so they were able to pick first from the prize table. Jared was excited to take home the giant water pistol that he had his eye on all week. Caleb, with the opportunity to pick anything he wanted, chose a Hershey bar--that's my boy!
Jared invited Tyler today, so he was able to spin the prize wheel again! He won a Slinky. I saw Gracie playing with his Slinky this afternoon and mentioned to him, "That's going to get tangled if Gracie plays with it." He replied, "Mom, when I spin [the prize wheel], I spin for the whole family. That's okay."
Jared and Caleb are having a WONDERFUL time at Vacation Bible School this week. This year's theme is "The Rescue Zone." Here's an idea of what they do each day:
Missionary story told by Aunt Dee
Craft time with Miss Sue and Miss Julie
Bible story and Bible verse with Mommy
Game time and snack time with Aunt Corinne
Visit from a Rescue Hero (Police, Fire, Search and Rescue)
Before they go home, they get to Spin the Prize Wheel if they bring visitors
So far each boy has been able to spin the prize wheel--Jared twice, and Caleb three times! Yesterday we went to McDonald's for lunch. After lunch, Jared told me that while going down the pink slide, he prayed for a little boy to come to the play area so he could invite him to VBS. Isn't that precious?
Gracie and Lily have "class" with Gramma. Gramma takes her morning walk in Lakeport while pushing the girls in their stroller, they play in the nursery, and then join the big kids for song time and snack time.
Jared is doing a fine job of taking care of things while Phil is away. This afternoon he fixed the handle on the sliding glass door. He knew which screwdriver to choose from his toolbox by looking at the screws on the handle.
We received a package in the mail today from Phil. The kids received University of Washington T-shirts and Space Needle postcards. My gift was a UW sweatshirt, which I only wore for the photo shoot. It's nearly 100 degrees here today! Thanks, Phil! That was so sweet of you.
I'm going to be the matron of honor in my sister Lizzie's wedding this summer. It's an evening wedding, and she wants her bridesmaids to wear black. She let me pick out what I want to wear. Wasn't that sweet of her? I ordered this yesterday from J. Crew. We think it's very "Audrey Hepburn." What do you think?
This morning at breakfast I said to Jared, "You're my favorite Jared in the whole world." And then to Caleb I said, "You're my favorite Caleb in the whole world," to which he replied, "You're the biggest mommy in the whole world." I'm going to assume that my sweet three year old son was paying me a compliment.
This afternoon I found Gracie up on Jared's top bunk wearing her Easter bonnet and "reading" the Bible that was given to her at her baby dedication. The Bible was actually in a little box in her closet. She must have figured out what it was on her own, because I don't remember showing it to her.
Anyone thirsty? You should have stopped by our Lemonade Stand this afternoon! We charged only 10 cents per cup. Jared was disappointed that we didn't charge $1.00 per cup. The kids decided to use the proceeds from the sale to send Daddy healthy food. We probably only made enough to send him one granola bar! I might have to contribute a little to their fund.
My mom watched the kids for me tonight so I could do some much-needed grocery shopping in town. When I returned, I stuffed my frozen food (which included Popsicles) into her freezer, and then I walked across the street to the library with the boys. The girls enjoyed Popsicles on Nana's back porch, and the boys and I found great books at the library. They always seem to want to check out the same books over and over again, but this week I managed to distract them, and we browsed the New Books section. Caleb was excited to find a brand new Max and Ruby book sitting on the shelf. Jared checked out several Beatrix Potter books.
**Michele, make sure you read Phil's response to your "bus" comment in the Seattle post.
I'm in desperate need of a nap right now, but I'm waiting for Caleb to fall asleep. While I wait, I thought I'd post something about our whirlwind-weekend. Corinne and I took the kids up to Seattle this past weekend to see Phil. We had a wonderful time visiting with him. On Saturday we stopped by the Van Der Meersches and the kids went swimming in their pool. We stayed at my friend Emily's house on Saturday night, and then spent Sunday afternoon walking around Seattle Center. I couldn't find a picture of everyone smiling, but the kids really did enjoy themselves! We found a great water fountain for them to play in. Caleb was so brave! He didn't mind getting completely soaked. All of my blog readers who are experienced moms will notice that I made the mistake of letting my children eat cotton candy after playing in the fountain.
