School Days

We started school again last week so one day, we went outside to take some school pictures!

 1st grader!!

 She had her own ideas for some poses and props. :)

How is it that "1st grade" sounds so much older than "kindergarten"?!

On Broadway!


Several weeks ago, Chris and Laura Anne had a daddy/daughter date at Chick-fil-A. We love our Chick-fil-A and take part in their special events whenever we can. While they were there, they won tickets to see and upcoming show! Beauty and the Beast!!! How crazy exciting!!!

So that's where the 2 of them are as I write this. I can only imagine what the experience is like for a 6-year-old!

Here are some pictures of this special day!


The tickets!! Woohoo!



Her fancy 'do



We had to get dinner together for Chick-fil-A appreciation day!! The kids and I stayed in the van to avoid all the chaos inside. :)



Here they are, about to leave!

Chris texted me this picture of Laura Anne in the theater before the show started. How excited she must've been!!

I can't wait until they get home and she can tell me all about it!

Officially Unofficial

We officially have 2 unofficial pets. Laura Anne found this cute little peewee (baby lizard) inside the house last week. We let it go outside but it lives in a plant right by the front door. His name is Herman. Peewee Herman. ;o)

 And this cute little kitty is Wubbzy III. In case you didn't remember, there was a black cat that hung around Granny's house when we lived with her for a short time 3 years ago. Laura Anne named him Wubbzy. Then there was cat that hung around our house when we lived in Deltona and that was Wubbzy as well. So of course, when this kitty started hanging around, Laura Anne immediately wanted to name him Wubbzy. It stuck, and Wubbzy is outside our door everyday. Poor little guy. He's really skinny and has the sweetest personality. I don't think he gets food from anyone else because every time I open the door, he's right there. So yes, I caved and started buying him some cat food and he loves me now.

It's kind of funny to me that cats seem to be drawn to us, considering 2 of us have cat allergies. This is the closest we'll ever get to having a cat as a pet!

Proud Moment

I had to buy this shirt for Laura Anne a few weeks ago. See, if you know my girl, she's always singing. While she's playing, while she's getting dressed, while she's in the restroom, etc. She always has a song on her lips. So I bought her this shirt (yes, it was on sale!), and the next day I asked her if she wanted to wear it. Her reply was, "yes, but that's not my life. God is my life."

That's my girl. <3

Brothers

Sigh. I love my boys.

Learning

Someone is learning how to write his name.

Toothpicks

She did this with no prompting from me. :)

Spring Is Here!

I'm excited about this year. March is over, and while it was a very busy, the rest of our year will be anything but boring! Tonight we get to take the kids to a baseball game! I love going to baseball games. It just feels like the All-American thing to do. :)

In May, Chris and I will be celebrating our 9th anniversary and we will be taking a weekend getaway to Orlando! I'm so excited!

And all things wedding are filling my brain lately because my dear little sister's wedding in October! I'm thrilled that I get to help her decorate and plan for her special day. I'm also excited because I ordered my maid of honor (I don't like the word "matron") dress in a size smaller than I thought I would! :D

I will try to pop in occasionally to share a picture or two with you. Don't give up on me yet! ;o)

Bye bye baby....

...tooth!

Recap

So here's what you missed:

Laura Anne had a birthday!

Caleb's big Christmas gift this year was a train table with lots of Thomas the train tracks and engines to go with it.

Laura Anne's big Christmas gift was a bike!

On more than one occasion, I caught Stellan on the table nibbling off of our gingerbread house!

We visited with cousins and grandparents in Jacksonville

I couldn't resist a picture opportunity because the 3 boys were all wearing Cars shirts. :)

In January, we had a great family day at a playground, and then had a picnic at a park. It was beautiful.

I'm hoping to be able to stay caught up with the 'ole blog. We'll see if that works out. Does anyone even read it anymore? .....hello? (crickets chirping)

Happy Holidays!

You won't normally hear me say "happy holidays" but I am trying to cover my bases. I missed Christmas and New Year's on the blog, and since Valentine's Day is right around the corner, I'm including that, too. :)

These three adorable little people are keeping me busy this year. We're moving right along through LA's kindergarten year of homeschooling. Caleb is learning more, too and we are still doing occasional experiments and hands-on activities. They both love those so much so it 's definitely time well spent.

Laura Anne turned 6 in December (what?!) and has her first loose tooth!

Caleb will be 4 soon and is a super sweet heart. His favorite thing right now is Tim Tebow!!

Stellan is 18 months old and really showing us his personality lately. He's a very stubborn and strong-willed boy with a temper to boot, but he has a marshmallow side, too that makes him irresistable. :)

This year will be a busy one! In March, my sister is graduating from her internship and the next day, Chris and I are taking the 2 older kids to Disney World for their first time! Also in March, is the Gate River Run which I will be running in! After a few attempts at it, I'm hoping to finally finish my first 15k! The weekend after that, Chris and I are going to Orlando to see Dave Ramsey! Awesome!

Later this year are wedding festivities! As you may remember, my little sister is getting married in October! Not only am I her matron of honor (yay!), but I will be taking engagement photos for them, possibly bridal portraits for her, planning a bridal shower and helping out with decorations! I'm super excited and can't wait!

That's all for now. I only had a few minutes to let you all know I'm not dead. :)

Melty Crayons

Our latest art project turned out pretty cool:

Science and Art

In an effort to make learning a little more interesting, we've recently done a few science experiments. First, we made our own volcano. We got the idea from my special edition of Family Fun magazine called "Create and Learn".

The kids loved the volcano so we did it several times and made a variety of colors.

Then we made slime. You might remember the stuff called Gak. Well this is essentially what we made. Thanks to my newest obsession, a website called Pinterest, I found this recipe.

Caleb chose green, his favorite color, and we mixed up a batch of slime. Later, I made some purple slime for Laura Anne. It entertained them for a while!

I've also been encouraging their inner artists lately. Our favorite type of art currently is water paints. Caleb could seriously paint for a few hours straight. He paints page after page of colorful splotches (which I'm sure in his brain are detailed pictures).

I love having a kitchen filled with little people's artwork.

Since there are so many, I'm thinking of covering some with contact paper so the kids can use them as placemats.

I love making learning fun. And seriously, Pinterest is the best idea ever. I don't know how I lived before it. :)

Thoughts And Toes

Stellan is 15 months old today. He has 4 new teeth coming in, 3 of which are molars.

Laura Anne has one more soccer game left. We will all be sad to see this soccer season go, but we will look forward to future ones, if that is what she wants to do!

The kids were watching a movie from the comfort of Caleb's Cars tent last week. This was my view:

We've been busy with homeschool experiments and crafts. More pictures to come!

Ummm

I feel like I should introduce myself. Hi, my name is Brianna and I'm the author of this poor, neglected blog!


The past few months have been the busiest of my life. We have homeschooling, soccer, church, family time, Bible studies. All this and the house still needs to be cleaned, clothes need to be washed and children need to be fed and bathed. It doesn't leave a lot of time for blogging! I've been contemplating the idea of just letting it go, closing the blogging chapter of my life, but I'm not quite ready to do that! So the posts may come a little less often, but for now I'm still here.

That being said, let's move along with some updates. Laura Anne is playing Upward soccer right now. She really enjoys it! Part of her bedtime prayers every night include praying for her to "keep getting better at soccer". I'm thankful for Upward and for the ability to have her try out an extracurricular activity.

Homeschooling is going really well so far. We had kind of a rocky beginning but we're all getting the hang of it now. She's ahead of the game, but we're still going through her kindergarten books just to make sure we cover everything. Plus, I'm teaching some to Caleb too as we go along.

Speaking of Caleb, as of this week we have FINALLY made some progress in the potty training department!!! Wahooo!!!! I'll tell you what, I thought for sure we'd be potty training Stellan before long and HE would be the one to teach Caleb!! Ha! But things are finally clicking and we have even had a few outings where Caleb was wearing big boy undies instead of a diaper!

Stellan is 14 months old, walking all over the place, eating big boy food with the family and drinking whole milk from a sippy cup! No more nursing! We're still working on the sleep thing, but this week he has done pretty good sleeping through the night. (In our book, that means not waking up before 5am!) :) He's our early riser, waking up between 6 and 6:30 almost every morning!

The kids and I spent a week in Jacksonville a couple weeks ago. While we were there, I had the privilege of meeting and photographing my newest nephew, AJ!! What a precious little bundle! He was only a week old! He was a good little sleepy boy for our photo session (the second photo session, that is!)

Isn't he just a doll?!

Another important event to note is that my little sister, Sheri, got engaged!!! I am sooooo excited I can hardly stand it!!! Not only will I have the honor of taking some photographs for her and Charles at some point, I will be her matron of honor and get to plan a bridal shower!!!! YAY!!!!

As for me, I'm running again. I never really got back into it after Stellan was born but now I'm running 4-5 days a week and I feel great! I'm still photographing for family and friends and loving it. Chris and I have this idea that we may launch a photography/design business together sometime in the future! He's actually working on a logo design for a friend right this minute. :)

So, friends, if you are reading this, thank you for sticking around. I promise to try to do better at keeping you informed and updated and to provide pictures, of course.