goings on around here

our most exciting news of this week is that alexis, our resident sophmore, made

VARSITY CHEERLEADER!!!

(in raider blue for our raider nation inhabitants! ;)

 she is excited and nervous and cute and happy.

she worked hard and she deserves it.

we are so proud of her.

 our other exciting news is that our deck has been officially started!

not unofficially, like it's been the last few months, but actual, holes have been dug!

yay, yay, yay!!!

hamming it up, much?

tony is the same kind of dork as matt, so he was only too happy to pose for a silly picture.

today the holes will be inspected and the cement will be poured. then work, work, work all day tomorrow and saturday! did i say yay, yet?

addie, the budding photographer got a hold of the camera. 

i just love this baby'o'mine!

 daddy found a rocking horse for a good price while we were in seattle.

we were thinking (hoping) it might be an amish made rocking horse, but upon further inspection we found the made in china stamp on the bottom.

still nice and the girls still love it.
(actually, all 4 of them love it)

i was trying to get a picture of only frankie on the horse, but addie was m-a-d, mad and would not get out of the picture. and then i thought it was hilarious that she's giving me the total evil-eye.

 and sisterly love.

(and crazy hair. i swear i do her hair before we leave the house!)

 on tuesday sweet baby franks wore training panties for the first time ever! 

i'd ask her if she had to go potty and she would run her chubby little legs over to the bathroom.

(shown below)

 i tried to get a picture of her in her undies, but she was all like "wear panties, must run," and wouldn't sit still for a second.

 she's such a climber!

 the panties lasted for about 3 hours, during which time she sat on the potty at least 10 times (=10 mini m & m's), actually used the potty 0 times, peed on the kitchen chair once, and pooed in a still unknown corner of the house once. 

all in all, a good first potty training day. :)