Passel of Kids and a Barrel of Fun

The past two weeks I've had a small remuda of kids runnin around the house. Besides our friends' 4 month old baby and our two boys, I've been watchin our niece and nephew. Wyatt and Easton are only 3 months apart and Addyson is the oldest, at 4, and has been my little helper. Wyatt loves to help too...don't get me wrong...

...but with his cousin's here he's kinda been busy. Really, they all have been busy. I've just been the referee. We've had issues of 'that's mines!' and 'it's my turn!' and some certain individual words that have popped up more than I'd like to hear, like, 'don't!' and 'stop that!'. For the first week and a half Wyatt was still in his no-sleepin-during-nap-time phase which made the days dark and gruesome (for everyone). His poor cousins got the brunt of his grumpiness and I had to intervene and reap that bushel of dealing with him after consequences had been enforced. In this past week, he's actually slept during nap time and it has made a world of a difference in the evenings and consequently the mornings.
Those kids! They've grown up outside and would rather be there than any other place. Through the cold mornings, rainy days, and hot sun they have spent every spare moment outside. By 9 a.m. each of them have hands caked in dirt and mud, hair speckled with dry grass and peppered with dirt. Their faces are dirt-smudged and their ears are the catch-all for anything airborn. Somewhere, this past week, they found a paintball in the yard from the neighbor kid. Naturally, one of them had to pick it up and squeeze it. Splat! Bright sky blue paint spattered all over Addyson's upper body! There's been fights and arguments and kiss-ups:

Like I said, they've been busy! They've scattered bricks all over the yard, only to turn around, draggin the big red muck bucket to pick up all the bricks. They tell me they were pickin up horse poop.
At one time, they chose a brick, and pretended it was their baby. I found that baby in the swing:

These bricks here in a pile were at one time all dumped in my flower bed.

The poor hosta took a beatin:

I know they'll survive but they look pretty mauled.
The kids tried to handle the wheelbarrow. That didn't work out so easy for them.
In this first picture the rubber tire Addyson is holdin is Buster's chew toy which he never chews on. It became her baby one day. It went with her everywhere!





Most the bricks ended up in the big trash can:

The yard now looks like this:



A messy yard means happy kids:







He is happy, he just had sun in his eyes:





And happy kids mean happy dogs:

The Stork Has Delivered!

My second-born sister just had her first baby last week Thursday. Her pregnancy followed the same path as mine did, particularly with Wyatt, in that she started showing signs of preeclampsia about 2 months prior to her due date. Her body was so swollen. Her legs looked like tree stumps. Thankfully her nose never got as wide as mine did!!
Since baby Devon Rose has joined this world I've fought the urge to buy a plane ticket and run out there to eastern Pennsylvania. It has been really hard. This is the first of my blood neices/nephews to be born. My parents, 3 other sisters and brothers-in-laws have kept me updated minute by minute, hour by hour with what has been goin on and tons of pictures!
Baby Devon was born via c-section after 9 hours of my sister laboring. At 9 hours in, the doc was concerned about my sister's blood pressure and the baby was showing signs of stress. Devon started movning back up the birth canal. Devon was born at 6:26 p.m. (eastern time) on April 9th, 2009. Daddy was by momma's side the entire time. Initially there were problems with Devon's breathing and temperature but they got that taken care of. My sister is still in the hospital because her blood results showed that her liver was high in enzymes. Her magnesium levels were seriously low. Her blood pressure was still higher than it should be. She has been on bedrest since the birth.
As the oldest sister, my heart is aching to be there with her. I never knew it would be this hard. For the 8 years since I've moved back home to Kansas, my sisters and I have become closer than ever. Despite the 1000+ miles that separate us my relationship with each one is strong. I love my sisters so much. We've had quite a life together growin up. We've experienced so much. In just this past year we have seen our parents marriage end. Our ages are 30,28,26 and 23. This was no shock to us as we have seen it slowly crumble since we were old enough to sense something was not right. Through the breakdown of their marriage, we have spent years living at a Bible college, being pastor's kids, spending 35-45 weekends per year in churches all over the Midwest and East Coast for 6 years, being missionary kids, living in a third world country and the only white kids in an entire province, returning to the US knowing it was because of our parents relationship, moving out of our parents home, college, marriage and now babies. My sisters and I know each other inside and out. We stick together. We've had to. Many times it was just us four girls together, battling emotions, scars, situations, and strife that we could do nothin about 'cept pray. We have prayed a lot together: for our parents, for our lives, and each of our families. Now, as my sister is starting her family, I want so much to share that with her. I want to be up with her for her mid-night nursings. I want to just be with her as she experiences the miraculous inexplainable thing we call motherhood.
*(2hrs after I started typing this)* I just got a call that she should be goin home today!!!
Proud Papa:





Aunt Tegan (who is just weeks away from delivering her first baby) holding baby Devon:

Uncle Dan and Aunt Chels:

There's no place for a baby like a mother's side:

I want to hold her SO bad!
And here she is, 6 days old:

This.Is.Unbearable! I want to go right now!!!

Just Because

I'm postin these pictures just because I need them. I like seein them. They make me feel better. They are hibiscus blooms from the plant I received at my grandmother's funeral of which I've had for 2 years.









Because seein these made my Monday better.