handsful

Under rainbow skies…

Living “on the way to Disney” has it’s advantages.  Mainly the chance to see friends and family that we miss from NC.  The Deckert family stayed with us last night, leaving this morning for Jeff’s business conference / family vacation to Orlando.  We’ve known Jeff and Jan for years, we were friends BK (before kids) and our children played together when they were little. 

Here they are playing together now that they’re bigger :)  Nice shot, Abbey.

Boys, stop squirting the girls so I can get a decent picture!

Thanks…here’s Abbey, Taylor, and Marley

Payton, Ethan, and Ryan

Randy snuck up and got a pic of Jeff and Jan. ;)

Thanks for taking time to hang out with us during your vacation, guys!

Randy and I are trying hard to dedicate time to each child, individually, every so often.  Today was Marley’s day with me and she chose brunch and a pedicure.  It was a sacrifice I was willing to make for my daughter..heh heh. 

The “let’s take a nice picture of ourselves” picture…

and, the necessary “let’s act like goofy girls” picture.  I’m sure people were watching, but we didn’t notice. 

Our glammed up toes…mine are the ghostly white feet on the left.  Sun rejects me. 

We also made a stop at the kids consignment shop, Marley found a cute pair of skinny jean shorts and I, of course, had to buy a little dress for Lainey.  It was a fantastic morning, I loved hanging out with my middle daughter.  She’s the child that looks most like me (if you squint a little and imagine darker hair…) and she’s most like me in personality, too.  She has a lot going for her.  :)

My parents came down for a visit in early July and I’m a bit late in posting the pics (much to mom’s impatience…ha).  So…

It was a great weekend, with no huge plans other than hanging out together. 

Granma brought a fun toy for the kiddos to play with…they played so hard, one of the handles broke.  Another item for the sewing basket. 

There were presents to open (they brought b-day gifts for L, M, P, and E) and dinner to eat (Times Grill…yummy).  Lainey ended the evening for us with a happy dance. 

Granma and Lainey enjoy the fine art of sidewalk chalk on the back porch. 

Sunday morning came way too soon, and they had to head back North. 

Till next time…we’ll see you in August and you’ll be back here in November!

For the past few days, we’ve spent our evenings de-weeding our pool area.  And, there’s a reason there’s no before shot.  I would have died of embarrassment.  I mean it was BAD.  We’ve been so busy with summer activities, there’s been no time.  Everytime we had time to do it, it rained. 

Anyway, so after working so hard in the FL heat, we were hot.  Covered in mulch and assorted yard debris.  Basically icky.  So, there was only one thing to do. 

Who needs showers?  For that matter, who needs swimsuits?

Chlorine works about as well as soap, right?

We all thought it was a good idea. 

And, in case you were wondering.  I got in too, though not exactly voluntarily.  My sweet husband felt the need to grab me and jump in with me. 

I think some of the best memories of family are the ones that aren’t planned.  :)

Wanted to quickly add the pics from our “lost” vacation day…when Randy took the bigs to go white water rafting and I took the little to visit Patricia.  She has 6 children, 3 nearly grown men and 3 lovely ladies from China. 

Lainey, Willow, Piper, and Sage.  I tried, but this is the best shot of all 4 I could get!  Patricia did much better and posted pictures on her site http://www.littlecabininthewoods.typepad.com/.  She takes GORGEOUS pictures, I’d love to spend gobs of time learning from her.  Check out her post “Summertime” to see more from our day. 

Here is her youngest gal, Willow.  Even though Lainey and Willow are almost the same age, Lainey outweighs her by 10lbs!  She’s an adorable little thing!  Patricia and I had never met before, but we knew each other through our adoption agency’s Waiting Child program.  We were waiting for our referrals at the same time (her 3rd, my 1st adoption) and actually received our match calls on the same day!  Once we decided on Banner Elk/Boone for our vacation, I quickly emailed Patricia to plan our visit.  She was so gracious to let us hang out and play in her sweet log cabin.  Patricia is a very laid-back woman who loves life for the simple things…as a woman who struggles with “letting my hair down”, I can learn much from her. 

One of Lainey’s favorite things at Patricia’s house was her family of bunnies…a mama, dada, and 2 babies.  So soft!  They were hopping in and out of our laps and Lainey took it upon herself to re-arrange the bunnies cage.  I’m sure they appreciated her eye for style. 

While we were having our lazy visit in the woods, Randy and his crew were doing anything but being lazy! 

Excuse the digital picture OF a digital picture (these were taken by the group photographer and we were able to purchase them).  Here they are, gently floating down the rapids. 

Another run, and this time not so peaceful!  This is a section of the Watauga River where you can run the rapid, paddle to the shore, walk your raft back to the top, and ride again.  They did this several times.  The guide in front is hamming it up for the camera.  He was their favorite guide. 

I’m not sure what the end result of this run was, but it makes me kinda glad I spent that day in the woods :)  They loved every second of it.

Eleven years ago yesterday, three of the cutest kids entered the world – all within 3 minutes. 

I gave each child the privilege of choosing what we had for each meal of the day.  Ethan had breakfast. 

I cheated and used crescent roll dough. 

The breakfast theme continued with Payton’s choice for lunch – pancakes.  They’re supposed to be 11’s.  Don’t be too critical. 

Once Randy got home, we did presents…an Ipod charger/speaker/clock radio for Payton.  He loved it. 

tracks for Ethan…to go along with the fishing poles and gear that Randy got him a couple of weeks ago. 

Marley is positively joyful over her present.  Picture coming up.  ;)

Marley chose dinner at Chili’s…good choice!  They treated the birthday trio to free desserts. 

We’d not planned on the desserts – the birthday cake was waiting at home.  Well, since I’m THAT kind of mom that just HAS to have the blowing-out-the-candles shot on the ACTUAL birthday…

Yes, it’s a hamburger.  No, I didn’t make it – again, I cheated and bought it.  Maybe next year I’ll do more of the homemade thing. 

Marley’s present??  A tiny little thing…

she calls Boone.

July 4th has become a split holiday for us…first half we celebrate our Lainey’s birthday and then we switch gears and do the red/white/blue thing.  It’s hard!  I wonder if she’ll eventually want to have her birthday on the 3rd.  Must be that much harder to have your b-day on Christmas or Easter! 

Here’s how she started her day:

Does that look comfy to you?  After I turned her table top fan off (which always wakes her up INSTANTLY), I got this:

Stretch, yawn.  Smile.  We’re blessed, she almost always wakes up happy as a clam. 

Now, a girl has to begin her birthday clean, right? 

Rinsing her hair with a butter tub.  That’s right, we’re high class. 

The next part of the day was spent riding to the dealership to pick up Randy’s car (it had been there during our vacation for oil change, etc.) and then some errands.  Including Target, where we bought Lainey a new booster seat.  We call it her big girl seat. :)

After lunch and a nap, it was time for cards and presents. 

She was jabbering away with the card, and then the $$ fell out.  As you can tell from the pic, she was shocked.  She jumped up and started handing out her money to each of us.  lol… We gave her an Aquadoodle mat and a toy camera and THEN we had dinner.  This is all riveting, huh? 

How old are you, Lainey??

Carvel ice cream cake!  She was so excited to BLOW out her candles (she’d been practicing), but didn’t quite have the air pressure to do it (darn fistula).  Daddy ended up helping a little. 

We devoured the cake, I changed her into her 4th of July shirt, and we headed out to watch fireworks at our friend’s parent’s pier.  Lainey heard the first one, promptly buried her head in my neck, scared to bits.  I took her home…we had some “rock rock” (rocking chair) time and I put my big 3yr old to bed. 

I’ll have her updated weight/height after her well check up next week.  Until then, here are a few things we learned about Lainey on our vacation. 

1.  She loves spicey wasabi peas.  She called them daddy’s brown food. 

2.  She prefers fast carnival rides over kiddie rides. 

3.  She has zero fear of heights. 

4.  In the car, she loves to call your name over and over and over.  Then, once you look at her, she says “ummmm” and trys to think of something to say. 

5.  She hates loud noises. 

6.  She’ll only pee in the woods if you sing Itsy Bitsy Spider.  Sounds weird, but it worked. 

7.  She loves rolling down a grassy hill. 

8.  If she has a choice of color for something, it’ll always be blue.  Light blue to be exact. 

9.  She all of a sudden started actually coloring a few days ago…not just scribbling on the page, but actually trying to stay in the lines.  What a big girl :)