I keep reminding myself- Every mom goes through this!

Just wanted to take a minute and welcome my friend Michelle to the blogging world...Hopefully you will do a better job of staying current than I have managed lately. I look forward to following your blog and watching little Amesley grow up. I'm excited to read your thoughts and follow your journey in faith- I already can tell how much I am going to learn- and hopefully you will learn from me that the adventures in motherhood are always messy, often frustrating, and usually the funniest stories you will ever hear or tell!

And on that note.... I ended up back at the Honda dealership yesterday, with the twins and Adam (who by the way was dressed as a pirate for pirate and princess day at preschool!). My check engine light on my car came on AGAIN! So we went in, obviously frustrated, and of course they took me right back- no one wants to know what its like when twins start to get bored! My car when hooked up to their code reader again showed the same code that led them to replace my entire computer system last week, but here's the kicker! Yesterday, the lead technician was available to look at my car, and explained to all of the men working for him that a loose battery cable on a Honda will bring up the same code! Yep! You guessed it! My positive battery cable was loose! And they had already replaced my entire computer system! Guess I'm lucky it was still under warranty! I sure wouldn't have been happy if I'd paid for that!

I think Daniel and I are suffering from severe loss of brain cells- after his fender bender and my car mishaps had us down to one rental car, 2 adults, and 4 kids for a day, we were so excited to get the van back. Two vehicles is an absolute necessity in our world and just a few hours was almost longer than we could manage! Then on Thursday night we misplaced the keys to the rental, and it was supposed to go back on Friday! We turned the house upside down for probably an hour before calling a locksmith, who promptly popped the lock and set off the alarm in the car! We were very lucky that the keys were actually in the car- as we didn't actually know until the horn was already blaring! The funny thing is the car was not locked until about 5 minutes before we realized the keys were missing! Daniel had to lock it to keep Hannah from playing in it! I'm filing this story away under the heading of "You might have too many kids if..." My friend Lindsey and I have recently had a running joke about the book we are going to write called "you might be a mom if...". Maybe "too many kids" could be the sequel? If anyone has any stories like this one, I'd love to hear them. I'm really needing to feel better about my parenting and organizational skills these days!

Field trips, Football, and Fancy Footwork!

Just wanted to take a minute and post a couple of pics. Last Friday, I took Hannah and Adam to the Montgomery Zoo on a field trip with Hannah's class. Nana met us there to help me watch Adam so that I could participate as much as might be necessary with Hannah. As it turned out, she was far too interested in her friends to care that I was on the field trip at all- but we still had a fun day. Also, yesterday I climbed up into our attic to retrieve another round of hand-me-downs for the twins that we put up from Hannah and Adam, and I found the little Alabama romper that Steven and Jennifer gave Adam for his first Christmas. I decided that there was never a more appropriate time for that than right now! Look how cute he is! Ava has decided to really walk now. She seems to have decided she'd rather do that than crawl, so she walks usually 15-20 steps before giving up. I'll try to get some video and post it on here soon. Until then, assume that I am far too busy chasing her around! :)

The Rock Ranch

Yesterday we went to The Rock Ranch, which is owned by Chick-fil-A's founder, Truett Cathy, for the first of its 2008 Fall Family Fun Days. Chick-fil-A sent us passes so that we could treat some of our raving fans to a fun day as well, and several families from Columbus were able to enjoy the beautiful weather and family time. We had a great time and hopefully will get to go back again soon when we can maybe just take the two older children and allow them uninterrupted play time. I am posting some pics from yesterday- the ones on the cow bench seem especially appropriate for our family!

09/08/08

We've had a busy few weeks lately with both of the older kids starting school and the babies turning one... its been a while since I've blogged on here and I've got a lot of new pictures to post. I'm going to do one slide of just some fun pics I've taken lately of the kids and then one of some of the projects Daniel has been doing around the house. He recently made our fish pond bigger, as one of our koi had three babies and since they grow so large, we thought it was important to give them all the room they'd need. Also, for the last few days we've been working in the kids bathroom to turn it from cartoonish jungle animals to something that would be nicer for guest at our home. Surprisingly the kids like it better now, too! Ava has been trying to walk some lately, and has figured out how to stand herself up from the floor without pulling up on things. Brody is now deciding that he can let go of things and stand for a moment before he sits down. They both got riding toys for their birthday, and the funniest thing is to watch them push each other around- I love that they play together already! Adam is doing great in Pre-K and we just can't believe how smart he's getting- he's starting to tell us words in spanish lately! Hannah is loving first grade and we couldn't be happier with her school. She had her first soccer game on Saturday and it was a lot of fun watching her and her buddies really play hard- we think they even won! And Daniel and I.....well....I guess we can sleep when we're old!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABIES!

Yesterday we had Ava and Brody's first birthday party. They will actually turn one tomorrow. We had so much fun and the babies really loved their cakes. What fun they had making a big mess! Now we know that a twin birthday party looks a lot like Christmas- presents everywhere and a garage full of boxes and trash! Its been a while since I've had time to post on here...things have gotten really crazy lately, so I'm going to take a minute and also post some pics from Adam's first day of pre-K. He has been such a big boy and really loves going to Hannah's school! I'm also including our slide show from the birthday party for anyone that hasn't seen it and would like to. It's long- so watch when you've got some time on your hands!

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Back to School

Today was Hannah's first day of 1st grade. She was too excited to start back to school and get to see her friends again. They have moved into the new school building and it is really amazing. Wee got up this morning and I dressed Hannah and took lots of pictures, and then Daniel took her to school. Adam spent the whole day asking how many days Hannah was going to school before he got to go. He's really ready to start Pre-K. Soccer practice starts tomorrow, so we should have lots more cute pictures to post soon. Guess we are officially back in the swing of things!

Boys and Girls

Not a whole lot going on around here this week. We've been trying to get ready for school to start back next week and at the same time enjoy our last week of staying at home. Starting Monday the up and out the door routine becomes the norm again! I wonder how the babies are going to like not being able to sleep late...I wonder how I'm even going to handle it! I think Hannah and Adam have really enjoyed their summer being able to play together all day- I know they are going to miss that. We signed Hannah up for Columbus Youth Soccer last week and found out yesterday that she is going to be on an all girls team that consists entirely of her friends from school. We were hoping that would be the case but weren't sure since we signed her up late. I think practice starts the week after next and then the games will start the second weekend in September. She is really excited about it and I know having her friends out there will help to keep her from losing interest. The babies are all over the place now- pretty much crawling or cruising everywhere they want to go. Ava has taken a step or two on a couple of different occasions, but always decides that diving toward us and making us catch her will get her where she wants to be faster! Today the two of them wandered off and when I found them I had to take this picture. Look at what each of them found out of all the toys scattered between Hannah's and Adam's rooms!