instafied

thursday was black day. and awkward picture day. 

oh, addie.

thursday is also preschool day! i love preschool. i get excited when i set out their spots and nametags, when i put the surprise letter bag under the easel, when i put the books we'll read in order... it's so fun. :)

puzzles for our opening activity.

and 2 hours later, add 4 cute kids!

(frankie wasn't feeling it, i'm not sure why)

we learned all about sports, which culminated in playing with sports balls outside. i came in a few minutes before the kids to get lunch ready, and that's when things got really exciting. despite a long talk about playing with the water but not getting in the water, 4 out of 5 of them were wet (laney likes to join in). before the day was thru, 5 out of 6 of us needed a clothing change (i got marker on my pants).

 delaney was the only one that actually got in the pool, so she was completely soaked. silly girl.

 

snack time during our wrap up. this resulted in one of the funniest frankie pictures ever.

closer-up.

christian said she looks like one of the shrek's! awww, my pretty girl, in this very un-pretty picture. it reminds me of that old show christian used to watch with the kid called "football head." i love her. :)

every other thursday night is daisy scouts! happiness for the girls that got all of their supplies. addie says "daddy can sew on my badges!" little did she know they are iron on. humph.

after dropping addie off, frankie and i headed out to sissy's football game (chris was at bball practice and daddy and d were hanging out doing homework). it had been threatening to storm all day, but right before we left it starting lightning. i debated even going, but we went ahead. we hung out in the car for awhile and visited, just me and my sweet 3-year-old.

 

 hard to believe this gorgeous thing is my same football head girl, right?

we finally decided to go into the gym with the cheerleaders. sissy was so excited to frankie around. everyone ooohed and ahhhhed about her cute little cheer uniform. adorbs.

she thought she was hot stuff!

after about an hour they finally cancelled the game. froggie and i hightailed it up to church to my additional rs meeting that i was going to have to miss, but instead was just late to.

run, run, run, run, run.

 all's well that ends well!

hump day

brown day!

we headed to the library for a super packed 10 o'clock story time, and then quinn's house for a fun outside playgroup. my least favorite part of the day was the 48 times laney started crying and whining during playgroup.

 

my favorite part of the day was when laney very clearly said "bless you, daddy" and "i love you." serious mood swinging terrible two's going on.

 an honorable mention for fav moment was during teeth brushing tonight when i said "oh, i hate loud houseflies" and matt walked over and mr. miyagi style killed the fly with one swat of his bare hand. it was so awesome!

it's been ridiculously hot lately. poor chris had to go take pictures at the field hockey game (his yearbook assignment). while he was gone i set up the little outside pool for the girls which they happily played in for about 10 minutes. uggggggh.

 alexis' taxi service ran all afternoon. nipping that right in the bud. i know driving friends around is fun, but old car = conserving miles. right? plus also, joy riding with friends is probably never a good idea.

matt worked for several hours on downloading a needed school program onto our laptop, only to have to update said laptop to the tune of $$$. never ending.

and this awesomeness concludes our hump day.

back to africa

orange day!

and look who's the line leader! 

this was after the 3rd attack of the 2nd grader. on friday addie and i walked out early and were set to be the first in line. que 2nd grader, who bolted out of his house from across the street. addie started running, because we were already half way there. of course, the 2nd grader beat the kindergartner and this mama was disappointed. i know it's super silly, but my sweet little 5 year old clearly should have been first in line. big deep breath. 

so for today grandpa took addie out and she got there first. according to grandpa, 2nd grader came and stood right next to her. granpda, who knew the line leader drama, said very kindly in his grandfatherly way, "uh-oh, she was here first. maybe you can be first tomorrow." and hopefully we can put the line leader drama behind us. this mama's done.

yesterday was laney's turn to be sick and feverish.

me loves a cuddley baby!

sweet baby! she laid with me on my bed and i rubbed her legs and sang to her as she fell asleep.

i.love.her.

small baby, big bed.

i taped some of frankie's preschool homework to the table so she could write without the paper moving around and found this taped to the wall. pat yourself on the back, frankie!

and i love creative kids. dollhouse dolls on bunkbed blinds.

finally laney was feeling better. and rags are always nice on heads.

exciting news!!!

grandpa got his medical clearance to go back to africa. so we celebrated with dinner at olive garden. yummm!

mom and dad and laney time.

today was purple day!

everyone loves granpda's hat!

lexi came home at 11:30, matt came home at 12, we kissed grandpa goodbye and headed out to salsa's for becky's farewell lunch, then to a lexi dr's appt, then to a lexi eye dr appt. it was kind of a juggle, but matt dropped l and f off at alecia's and then headed up to dulles to drop grandpa off. after lexi's eye appt we picked the little girls up and finally came home. 

selfies with a happy girl.

two chin cutie.

these are sweet, sweet days.

yummy baby!

and i'm dreaming about staying for a weekend at this place.

ultimate lighthouse experience out in the middle of the atlantic!

yummm, spaghetti...

aaaand story time.

 

 the days of our lives.

Sunday naps

Today was the e's last day and they gave some really nice talks. We had a stake RS training meeting after church and that was great and informative too. I came home to a scooby doo marathon, so I went with it. Sometimes you just gotta go with it.

There is a teenage boy under all those blankets and pillows.

Addie asked if I'd lay with her and watch scooby, which she doesn't usually do. I had lots of other things to do (always) but I've been trying to not let those sweet moments pass me by, even when it's really hard to sit down and take a break, so I did.

Sleeeeeep....

No nap for me, Addie, or Frankie, (or Matt, who worked in DC) but everyone else got a nice nap in our napping house. Even Meghan.

We went to Mccombs for some white chicken chili, so I made some cornbread muffins. Chris needed to conduct a family meeting for his family life merit badge and we've been trying to do it for over a month, to no avail. Someone is always gone, sleepy, too busy, or we forget. So we took the opportunity to have our meeting and then scriptures and prayer with the mc's.

Laney is quite the scriptorian.

Grandpa turned Chris onto this Human Target series, so they watch a few episodes a week. I think it's pretty cute.

Tomorrow is the start of a fresh new week to start over with new goals and new resolve. What a blessing to start with a fresh, clean slate each new week! So grateful.

friday and saturday

on thursday night frankie started saying she had a headache. we put her to bed as usual, but by friday morning she was still complaining.

frankie doesn't get sick, so i decided to clear my day and cuddle with her.

we watched movies, and movies, and movies, and cuddled, and cuddled, and cuddled.

she threw up, felt hot, and still had a headache and sore throat, so i decided to take her to the dr to rule out strep, which is going around.

thankfully it's not strep! and even more thankfully she woke up feeling better. yay!

we like white trash babies up in here. especially ones that give dirty looks.

also on friday: chris took pictures for the yearbook at the field hockey game. alexis went to practice. we rented admission and l, c, and g watched with me (matt went to bed early because it's a navy weekend). it was so cute!

today alexis went to work at 10, when grandpa, the little girls and i headed over to abby's birthday party.

everyone had a fun time playing and didn't want to leave.

but we had to leave because we had another birthday party to get to! neighbor charlie celebrated his 5th with a delicious chocolate filled pinata.

frankie and delaney both fell asleep in the car, and since it was cool outside i let them stay, but they only stayed asleep for about half an hour and then they were cranky! like, other than addie, they wouldn't play by themselves and it was a little challenging on my own.

that party ended at 3, we came home and counted our loot and hit the bath.

i had planned on dressing them up in their cute cheerleader uniforms and taking them to the game so matt could wind down and finish his homework in peace (after working 6 days straight), but given our recent bout of illness, busy day, and lack of naps, i thought better of it. so we took early baths, got into our jams and had some cuddle time.

it's really hard to take a good picture of all three.

laney did some light reading. addie looked at this book and said "is that dr. phil?" oh yes, sweet girl! you know it!

we had subs for dinner. matt walked in as we were finishing up, i explained to him our new plan, kissed goodbye and it was off to the varsity football game where... we won!!!! it was a super fun game! it was tied and then l-town kicked a 41 yard field goal! and then, as the clock ran out, they intercepted and ran like 60 yards to score another touchdown! 28-18 baby! it would be soooo fun to have a winning season! we've won a scrimmage and our first game, don't call it a comeback!

 

i somehow left for the game without my phone, so no game pics. which is unfortunate because i wanted to do a fb, then blog series on friday night lights. like game #1 - and pic, game #2 - and pic... i still might do it and just borrow jana's pics from tonight. it was so fun!

i miss my hubby though. 

we really are like ships passing in the night and it's getting old. i read an article (ensign maybe?) recently that talked about how dividing and conquering is maybe not the best thing for a marriage.

 huh... that's like on our family crest, so that would mean we're in trouble.

 i do think, at least for our family we'll still have to divide and conquer, but it would be nice to see each other for more than a few minutes a day. or a date night might be nice too. just a crazy idea. ;)