Miscellaneous March Pictures

Justin loves Friday. He makes forts for him, shoots nerf guns at him, drives his remote controlled cars into him, and generally tortures him. Friday hates it.

Ashley got her tonsils out last week. Here she is all hair netted out. She felt silly. She handled herself beautifully. The nice anesthesiologist with the nice accent started an IV while she watched and was amazed that she let him do it. Then they wheeled her to the operating room, put her to sleep, and asked me to leave. 15 minutes later Ashley was tonsil free. She woke up in a lot of pain, but once she got a popsicle down and then some pain medicine she was okay. I watched her pain with my typical nauseated stomach and thought I was going to throw up. I had to keep reminding myself to keep it together for her sake. I hate seeing people in pain. Again, it's a wonder I ever survived nursing school.

Ashley is doing great now. We are exactly one week out. She is still taking ibuprofen around the clock but has been narcotic free as of yesterday. She says she will remember her new pajamas and the bead craft she got. Grandma Egbert also sent pajamas, which made her day. She received lots of phone calls and well wishes. It meant a lot to the both of us so thanks!

This was the morning of surgery. Katelyn still went to school. Justin went to Canon's house for the whole day (nothing new, but it was official), and Mia played with Madi and then spent the rest of the day at Hans' office. It was memorable. Then we had slurpees for dinner. I've been grateful that we live so close to 7-11.

I bought this outfit for Mia, which she assured me she would wear. She was lying. She wore it once. I laid it out last night for her to wear today and at about 5 something this morning she started screaming. I went into her room and she said, "I don't want to wear that in the morning." Seriously?!

We spent a Sunday afternoon at Garden of the Gods. I love it there. They kids play hard. They climb and scramble, and wear themselves out. I'm so glad it's warming up here.

Katelyn's new leo for advancing in gym. Ashley all decked out. I wish I could get her to do dance.

Justin made this very messy blue corn syrup thing at pre-school. He taped it to his window and the sun melted the blue stuff into a sticky mess all over his window. I threw it away. Justin has a love/hate relationship with school. He asked me to think about taking him out of school for the rest of the year. Canon doesn't go to school. So unfair.

Random February Pictures

My kids think a sunny day means they can jump on the trampoline in their swim suits. They are trying to pop the water balloons they are jumping with.

All dressed up for church. Isn't he handsome?

We finally got a few good snowstorms. We built a fort under the trampoline and then spent an hour sledding. It's fun that we can all do stuff together now. My family is growing up. And everytime I see this pink snow outfit on Mia I remember Justin wearing it. He was so pretty.

Hans decided to burn the many tumbleweeds and trash that migrate under our patio table. It's always great fun. It reminds me of the year he decided to burn our grass in hopes that it would grow back greener. It didn't. We just had burnt grass.

Mia watched safely from inside.

I bought Mia goggles. She loves them. I take her swimming with me most Tuesdays. She loves the date with me. She is an amazing, fearless swimmer. She needs constant watching since she just wants to swim alone, although she would drown if I left her to swim alone. I love love love this time with her. I love playing with her and getting insights into her 3 year old brain. She's funny.

Mia with fun dip. She was green for 3 days. Most likely because this is as often as she bathes right now:)

Justin has re-discovered smoothies. He loves dipping waffles into them. He even likes that they are green. For the last few weeks he's had green smoothie with waffles for lunch.

Katelyn lost more teeth. I think she's lost more then she has. She is still writing notes to the tooth fairy. The last one said something to the effect of, "Dear tooth fairy, are you rich? And what do you do with all the teeth you collect?" The tooth fairy, who is not me, wrote back a note telling Katelyn that she (he?) is in fact rich because she sells the teeth on ebay to trolls who then, etc. etc. She LOVED this.

He loves breakfast. Pancakes or French Toast every morning with lots and lots of syrup dip. Justin turns 5 this month. He asked me to buy him a motorable car. What he means is he wants a car that has batteries that he can drive in outside. Like the neighbors. Who let him use their cars whenever he wants...And less cool then the motorcycle that has an actual engine inside of it. Unfortunately I haven't been able to logic him out of this obsession he has with needing one of his own. I told him they were too expensive, he needed numbers, I told him, and he said then why could I buy a new treadmill that cost more then a motorable car and he'd just ask his friends to buy him one. He is driving my crazy. He gets fixed on one idea and then cannot let it go. I try and talk to him, but every time I start to go crazy. He just needs to be really really rich someday so he can buy all of walmart and target. This reminds me that when Ashley was 2 she told me she wanted to run a walmart when she grew up. Anyway, I am having Justin's party at aerials, which is his birthday present. He has a lot of faith that someone will buy him his very own motorable car. He's asked all the neighbors for one. We have new neighbors that moved in that have an almost 5 year old boy as well. Justin has spent all of his time begging to play with Canon. He also has two neighbor girls named Ellie who he is constantly playing with as well. He would happily play away from our house all day long. He has a couple of days. He goes from one house to the next to the next. I miss him when he does that, but when he's home he does not stop asking to go somewhere else so I'm always relieved when a neighbor lets him in. I counted the playdates he had last week and it was over 15. Seems excessive, right?

Katelyn's Promotion

Katelyn is now a level 3! Go Katelyn! This is a big deal. These are the girls that feed into their top program. If all goes well she should start competing in the 3rd grade. She is now going to the gym 7 hours a week and she loves it. She is nervous about the skills that she is being asked to do, but she is trying. She is really strong and is good at bar and has great balance on the beam with her cartwheels. She is scared to jump for the pit bar and if no one is watching will end her round off back handsprings with cartwheels instead. She is so cute out there in the gym. Hans and I got a babysitter and watched her on Friday night and had a great time. It's impressive to watch all the strength exercises they do. I would not survive down there with the 7 year olds. Come watch her with me!

Katelyn's Birthday

Katelyn turned 7 on February 12th. It's hard to believe she is this old. We had great fun for her birthday. We got a babysitter for Justin and Mia and the rest of us went to Color me Mine. Hans and I had fun watching and helping the girls paint their fairy ceramics they chose. Then Hans went to pick up Justin and Mia since Mia was throwing up and we went to Red Robin for dinner. Katelyn loves Red Robin and was excited to get her own ice cream to eat after dinner. Sunday we had the Morrills and Conleys over to celebrate with an ice cream cake that Kate designed. It was mint chocolate chip ice cream and strawberry ice cream with strawberry sauce on top. It was very interesting. She loved it. She was able to take ice cream cups to school to celebrate as well. She asked for zoobles for her birthday, which we got for her. She also spent her birthday money from her grandparents on two mice. They were very fun while they lasted. They had a really fun cage with lots of tunnels and spinning wheels, but after a week we realized they could escape from their cage and so we took them back to the pet store. So now she still has all her birthday money.