apparently, i'm out of sick days

i will chalk today up to being "one of those days". really, it could have been a lot worse. i should start off by saying that before the pity party begins!

the downhill slope actually started sunday morning...i had been feeling the beginnings of a cold all weekend, but it would come and go, so saturday was a pretty normal day. by late saturday night, i was feeling pretty lousy, and sunday morning, i was feeling really lousy. i should have just stayed in bed! but brian needed to be at church early, so i got the kids ready by myself and somehow made it to church. every time we stood up to sing, i felt the heaviness of my cold setting in. it was pretty pointless to be there, so i ended up driving brian's car home early to sleep. five minutes after i got in bed, i heard the front door close, and i got up to find my family walking in the door. brian explained that ethan was all broken out in a rash around his waist and his collar, and it was really bothering ethan, so brian just went ahead and brought the kids home. this rash was nowhere to be found when we left for church at 10:27, yet an hour later, it was as if ethan was wearing a 5 inch belt of severe irritation around his waist. all whelped up and everything. this confirmed my suspicion that ethan has developed an allergic reaction to my beloved clean breeze tide and downy. he'd had rashes off and on over the past month that i haven't been able to put my finger on, and we've been considering diaper, detergent, and food reactions. i'd already switched back to a "clean and free" detergent for ethan's clothes, but the outfit he was wearing yesterday has been hanging in his closet a while, not part of the last couple of loads that were washed with the clean and free detergent. (yes, i realize this post is supposed to be about me being sick... exactly my point!)

while i came home to crawl in my comfy bed and rest, i ended up giving ethan an oatmeal bath while brian fed caroline. after his bath, i took allllll of ethan's (clean) clothes out of his closet and dresser to wash in the clean and free detergent. note that i am already about 1 1/2 weeks behind on laundry, so having 2 or 3 loads of CLEAN laundry to wash is not helping things. but i surely want to get to the bottom of this rash. by last night, i was feeling worse, and brian was starting to feel bad too. and piles of laundry were taking over this house!

i am so thankful that brian stayed home from work today. i was able to sleep a little later today, but i still felt pretty crummy when i woke up. we just kind of survived today. the kids did great dealing with two crummy-feeling parents. brian was such a huge help, but i knew he didn't feel good either, so i tried to get off the couch every now and then to take ethan potty and to see what caroline was getting into. every time i returned to an upright position, ethan asked, "you not sick anymore, mommy?" no, mommy's still sick, but life goes on. and apparently mommies don't get sick days! brian and i took turns resting, and by dinner time, we were both feeling much better. i was actually feeling almost back to normal! i planned on finally folding some of this laundry after we finished the delicious chinese that brian picked up for dinner....

the kids had eaten while brian was out getting dinner, so they were playing quietly in ethan's room while we ate. i think i'd taken 3 bites of my egg roll and 2 bites of my sesame chicken when i realized i needed my water bottle from our room. on my way to get my water, i peeked in ethan's room to check on the kids, and the only thing worse than 2 kids in a very messy room is 2 kids in a very messy room with POOP all over the carpet. so much for feeling better. ethan was standing with one foot on his ride-on-rocket (now covered in poop) and one foot on the carpet, which at that moment, i was really wishing were hardwood floors.

(sigh.)

it was a mess. a really big mess. and my chinese was getting cold. and my head was getting foggy again. and did i say there was poop everywhere? not that you want this kind of thing to happen on any night, really, but tonite was just not the night. poor caroline was a trooper while we spent the next hour cleaning up ethan and his room and all the toys. (thankfully, there was no poop on caroline. not sure how that happened, but i'm thankful for it!) poor ethan now fully understands the seriousness of pooping all over his room and continuing to play in it. poor brian got the bad end of the deal, scraping poop off the carpet while i hosed off the poop machine in the bathtub, which i then had to disinfect before ethan could get an actual bath. we had to throw away some books, like my favorite board book version of brown bear, brown bear... we chunked some toys that were not wash-off-able, but we needed to get rid of some anyway. and there is of course, more laundry to do now! the saving grace of this whole experience was nature's miracle. i recommend this stuff to anyone who has a pet or potty training child in their house.

after ethan was bathed, his room was cleaned and aired out, and our reheated chinese was eventually enjoyed, i finally sat down on the couch tonite to rest. ethan crawled up in my lap and said, "i'm sorry mommy. i'm sorry for pooping in my room." then my heart pretty much melted. what a blessing to hear that heartfelt repentance from my son. i told him that i forgave him and that i loved him so much. i doubt it is the last time that he will not make it to the potty in time, but i'm pretty sure it will be the last time that he doesn't tell us about it!

so today wasn't exactly the quiet sick day in bed that i thought i needed, but praise the Lord, i am starting to feel a little back to normal, and it can only get better from here. :)

disney day 3: a kingdom of wonder!

i had every intention of sharing the rest of our wonderful disney trip after christmas, but here we are almost to spring break, and i have still left you hanging on "disney day 2"! i am sure you have been checking back daily for the last four months to finish your vicarious disney vacation!! haha. so without further ado, here is day 3 of 4. :)


we spent the afternoon and evening of 2 days at the magic kingdom. after we'd planned our trip, i discovered that ABC was filming the annual disney christmas parade the same weekend that we were going to be at disney... i was bummed. i knew this would make the magic kingdom so much more packed that it would have been otherwise. but hey, we were getting to go to disney, so i decided to get over it and to go with the flow! we avoided most of the filming by visiting the animal kingdom in the morning, but it was still extremely crowded! for those of you who have been to disney, you understand the excitement of that first entrance into the magic kingdom, your first view of the grand castle... well, here was our first view...


i don't know what was more stunning... the sea of people or the tarps and canopies glistening in the sun! ha! once we saw the mayhem on main street, we opted to ride the train around the park to frontierland. our first ride was splash mountain, which really made me miss ethan. he loves singing "zippidee doo dah", and the brer animals were a whistlin' and a singin' it the whole time. i think i got a little teary-eyed, thinking about how much ethan would LOVE this ride... until the part when you get SOAKING WET! and i'm not talking about the big plunge at the end! we got wet at the very beginning! we couldn't stop laughing about how wet we got. it was definitely unexpected. (you're probably thinking, "ummm, you were on a ride called SPLASH mountain!".. yes, i know, but i was really thinking that we'd get wet at the end.... which we didn't.) anyway, here we are after the ride. ok, so i guess we didn't get SOAKING wet, but it was a lot of water. :)

i just couldn't believe how many people were at the magic kingdom on this day. i always imagined december (except christmas week) to be really slow and empty. but i guess everyone else thought this was the best time to go to disney too! :) it was also a saturday. in the future, we will not visit disney during parade filming or on a saturday!! below is the swarm of people that we saw coming toward us as a parade was ending. we decided it was best to turn back around and wait for the crowds to thin out!



the first day that we were at magic kingdom, we saw both the christmas parade and spectromagic, a special lights parade. very fun. this is probably the moment that i missed ethan the most...i was watching how excited all the kids around us were getting, and i seriously almost started crying in the middle of the disney christmas parade!! but i took plenty of pictures for ethan to see when he got home, as well as some video. and he had a ton of fun looking at all of that once we got home. :)









we knew that this would probably be the one and only trip to disney without our children for a long time, so we happily skipped most of fantasyland and mickey's toontown the first day. by our last day, we had gone through our list of "must-do's", so we walked through mickey's toontown for the fun of it. what a cute little setup for the little kids! we felt a little silly touring mickey and minnie's houses, but we did it anyway. :) our favorite part was mickey's kitchen renovation, since we were (are) in the middle of a similar project! my only concern was that mickey and minnie had separate houses.... aren't they married?! any disney-o-holics (nichele, susan, debbie...), please clear this up for me!


the tools in mickey's garage say "craftsmouse" instead of "craftsman".
brian got a big kick out of that!
we LOVED walking right by the stroller parking lots that were everywhere!!

our first day at disney, the magic kingdom was open until midnight, and i was BOUND AND DETERMINED to stay until midnight because we could! now keep in mind that i was fighting a cold and was really feeling awful, and we'd stayed at downtown disney entirely too late the night before after driving to disney, but we were STAYING TILL MIDNIGHT! well, about 10:30, we were feeling a little tired, but we knew we had a while to go...so we decided to get a funnel cake to wake us up! but we not only bought one funnel cake...we splurged and each got our own funnel cake the size of the magic kingdom!!!! 'cause we were on vacation! oh boy........ what were we thinking? we each ate half of ours and felt totally horrible about throwing the rest away, but what were we to do? get sick or waste funnel cake... so we opted for the healthier choice! i couldn't believe that i couldn't eat my whole funnel cake. i was quite disappointed in myself!! alrighty, a whole paragraph about funnel cakes is a bit over the edge... can you tell i'm on a diet now?! you can see my sweet husband gingerly eating the beauty that is a funnel cake. with the magic kingdom glistening behind us. it was a beautiful moment. much prettier than our camera could capture. hope would've done a much better job with this shot. that's it, hope, you're coming with us on our next trip to disney! :) and for the record, we left the park by 11:30 that night. we almost stuck it to the man.

the castle!
main street was decorated so beautifully for christmas!
the fireworks at the end of the night were spectacular,
and i hope the little girl whose head was blocking
my perfect view of the castle really enjoyed them! :)


so magic kingdom was fun, but i think it will be much more enchanting to share it with our excited children one day (there, debbie, i said it.... magic kingdom would have been more fun with our kids!). our favorite park is up next!

ethan: a "don't forget the lyrics" theological disaster!

i can't believe i forgot to share this over a month ago...

one day several weeks ago, ethan was playing and singing, and it was obvious that he had a line from a song stuck in his head... i heard "i will seek You in the morning" over and over and over. it took me a minute to figure out that he was singing a line from "step by step", a song that we sometimes sing on sunday nights, but it's not one i frequently sing throughout our days at home. i asked him where he learned that song, and he said, "because i sang it at gram's church!" (in december!) then my mom told me she'd been singing it with him a couple of weeks before this day. well, we started singing the whole song, and boy, did he learn all the lyrics quickly! he would sing them while we were playing outside, eating lunch, alll day long! and this is what he was singing...

oh God, You are my God,
and i will never praise You.
oh God, You are my God,
and i will never praise You.
i will seek You in the morning
and i will learn to walk in Your waaaays,
and step by step You'll leave me, Lord,
and i will follow You all of my days.

um, quite the opposite of the point of the song, ethan! we're working on the real words. :) but i need to get it on video before he gets it right!

answered prayers

i have been waiting for months and months to write this post! back in october, i shared the story of my three sweet friends who were all pregnant after experiencing miscarriages. praise God, their pregnancies continued to be healthy, and now all three precious babies are here! sadie was born a few days after my original post about these babies, hanna was born one month ago, and noah arrived on easter morning! i have already gotten my hands on sweet baby hanna (but i have not taken nearly enough pictures of her yet!!!) , and i absolutely can't wait to spoil sadie and noah this summer when my college friends get together. june cannot come quickly enough!

i am going to make this short and sweet because i know you'd rather see these gifts of God than to read my babble... so please rejoice with me as you meet these precious babies....

sadie faith
daughter of gabe & christy
born october 16, 2007
7 lbs, 20 inches

hanna elizabeth kay
daughter of ryan & catherine
born february 23, 2008
8 lbs, 11 oz., 20 inches

noah scott
son of cary & ashley
born march 23, 2008 (brand new!!!)
7 lbs, 7 oz., 19.5 inches

thank you, Lord, for these beautiful blessings. may their parents seek Your face as they raise up these children in Your Name! may you provide the encouragement of other godly mothers and fathers to walk alongside them in this journey for Your Glory. amen.

psalm 139:14- i praise You because i am fearfully and wonderfully made; Your works are wonderful, i know that full well.

soundtrack for the easter post below

i had to remind ethan of some of the words, but as you'll see, he sang these on his own for the most part! (if you listen carefully, you can hear caroline singing "ahhhhh" in the background toward the end...)



"Christ the Lord is risen today", alleluia!
sons of men and angels say; alleluia!
raise your joys and triumphs high; alleluia!
sing ye heavn's and earth, reply, alleluia!





(just the chorus...)
up from the grave He arose
with a mighty triumph o'er His foes.
He arose a victor from the dark domain,
and He lives forever with His saints to reign.
He arose! He arose!
hallelujah! Christ arose!

Christ the Lord is risen today! Alleluia!

preparing for easter this year has been exciting. our church has recently begun providing a family devotional guide for the next sunday so that we can focus our family worship throughout the week on the following sunday's theme. this guide also includes a couple of hymns that we will be singing as a congregation the next sunday. for the last couple of weeks, i have been teaching the kids these hymns at lunchtime and other times throughout the day. in preparation for palm sunday, we sang "hosanna, hosanna, hosanna in the highest!" all week long... (as i was teaching ethan this song the first day, about the 20th time through, he stopped me and said, "there's a lot of hosannas in there, momma!") in preparation for easter sunday, we have been singing "Christ the Lord is risen today" and "up from the grave He arose". what a blessing it has been to hear ethan singing as he played with his cars, "sons of men and angels say, a-a-a-a-alleluia!" even caroline learned to chime in with "ahhh!" for "alleluia". :)

my hope for this easter was for ethan to get excited about the fact that Jesus is risen! i wanted him to grasp what we were celebrating and why. of course, talk about Jesus dying on the cross for our sins and His glorious resurrection is not reserved only for the week of easter, but it was a special focus this week. last night as i was putting ethan to bed, he said, "where is Jesus in church?" i did my best to explain that we cannot see Jesus but that He is with us everywhere. "oh." we sang some songs, and i kissed him goodnight. as i walked out of his room, he said, "i want to see Jesus." "what?", i asked to clarify. "i want to see a donkey and Jesus." i explained how Jesus rode in to town on a donkey a long time ago and that we would not see Jesus on a donkey tomorrow at church... but that he could look at the cross in the front of the sanctuary when he wanted to see Jesus. i reminded him that we were celebrating that Jesus did not stay on the cross or in the tomb, and that He is risen! oh to have the mind of a child. i can't even fathom what questions caroline will be asking by this time next year!!

speaking of my child's mind... today, we were enjoying a wonderful easter lunch at brian's parents' house, and i noticed that the sun was shining through the rose etchings in their front door's sidelight, and there were roses shining on the living room wall. we pointed out the roses to the kids, and ethan piped up and said, "Jesus aROSE!"

i pray that your easter was a blessed one! here are a few pictures of the kids today. they're not the clearest pictures because my children had been sitting through worship all morning and were ready to get down and MOVE AROUND!

preparing for sunday- i had to repeat this picture from last easter


note that they have their Bibles that we gave them last week. they have not put them down alllllll week long. sure, we want our kids to cling to the word of God, but i don't think that means that you have to take it to the potty with you!!!!!! these Bibles are already well worn in! ethan has been "following along" in his little Bible as we have read the easter Story in his storybook Bible... well, when there is an angel or giant or something big, the illustrations are vertical rather than the typical landscape setup. the other night, i turned the book vertically to show ethan and caroline the big angel pictured outside the tomb after Jesus' resurrection, and precious ethan turned his little Bible sideways too. :)

a-a-a-a-a-a-lelluia!

i tried desperately to get a close up of caroline in her sweet blue dress,
but this was the best i could do. that girl was ON THE MOVE!

happy easter from our family to yours!
He is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!

tea time!

today was a special day at mops.... we enjoyed "tea time", traditional english style... well, as traditionally english as a bunch of southern women w/ babies in their laps can be! :) each group decorated their table using fancy platters and such, and we even had gold flatware and fresh cut flowers to enjoy at our table! :) we each brought in a teacup to use (besides autumn whose best shot at a teacup was a flamingo coffee mug... we all got a good laugh out of that one! thanks, autumn!!). the owner of a british tea room in town spoke to us about the tradition of tea time and the proper way to prepare tea and scones (first place the cream and jam on your plate and then onto the scone as you eat each bite). we had cute little cucumber sandwiches and delicious homemade scones with clotted cream and jam. yuuuuum.

we were then blessed by hearing testimonies from three of the mops ladies. sylvia from our table spoke, but i did not get to hear her message because i was taking care of her newborn baby while she spoke.... i told her she'll have to give me the summary later!

our table has decided to visit the english tea room in town sometime soon. i am hoping that we can find a day when we can all go...especially jennifer, who was not able to be at our meeting today. (we missed you, jennifer!) so i'm excited about planning this fun outing for this special group of ladies who never cease to encourage me in some way.

here is a little peek inside our tea room today....


L-R: sylvia (with baby justin), autumn, nicole (standing),
holly (holding nicole's baby olivia), kellie (standing with emma), and me!
(excuse the busy background... i couldn't exactly ask
40 busy women to duck for the picture!!)
the homemade raspberry scones... yuuuuum. diet what? huh?
we actually had to take a picture of another table's sandwiches
because ours were gone in, uh, 30 seconds. there was one left when
we realized that sylvia was coming late!! ooops!!!
kellie's pretty teapot and dishes

wouldn't this be fun to do every afternoon?! when i was in scotland, we did have tea every day. not always the sandwiches and stuff, but always the tea. today was a fun, fancy time. i wonder how moms of small children do afternoon tea in england or scotland. pretzels and pbjs?? :) we had 2 babies and a sleeping toddler at our table today, and i can't imagine that those moms were dressing their scones quite to english tea time standards! so if there are any tea-timers out there with small children, let us know what your tea times look like.

potty boot camp

****warning!!!!!! very long post about pee and poop!!!!!!!****

potty training, take TWO! if you will remember back in september, i reluctantly attempted to potty train ethan. welllll that didn't last long. with our family's crazy schedule this year, i didn't feel like i could be as consistent as i wanted to with this great task! plus i was just not ready for pee on the carpet. so brian and i agreed that we would re-address the issue this summer when our lives were "back to normal". plus this gave me time to get up the nerve to ditch the diapers and go straight to underwear, as everyone has advised. so that was our plan.

in the last few months, ethan's sensitive skin has developed a rash along the elastic lines of his diaper, despite switching diaper brands. if he was younger and not near the point of potty training, we may have looked into cloth diapers (which i was wanting to do w/ him from the beginning until i chickened out) or some kind of natural disposables (i think target has organic ones??). but potty training seemed like the most obvious solution to this rash. so we prepared to start on monday, march 3.

i placed a clear jar of m&ms on the counter the friday before so that he could get pumped up about getting m&ms for going pee-pee in the potty. we talked about it every time we passed that colorful jar of chocolate wonder. every time i changed his diaper, we talked about it. when he followed me into the bathroom, we talked about it. (kinda like the deut. 6 of potty training, huh?) i made certain that he knew what we expected of him, and there was no turning back now.

i also made a GIGANTIC potty racetrack chart at a girls' craft night the weekend before potty boot camp. yes, i was surrounded by four dear friends who were all designing beautiful handmade cards, and i was making a potty chart. :) but it had to get done! later, i added a few pictures of ethan's favorite cars, and we were ready to "rock and go" as ethan says. i designed the chart to be a long road with stops along the way. each "stop" at towmater or sally or whoever earns ethan a "surprise" (translate: 88 cent football, etc.).


so monday morning came, and he woke up with a full diaper as usual. we went straight to the potty and he didn't need to go. ok, i thought, he probably just went in his diaper. so we put on his big boy underwear, i set the timer for 10 minutes, and he went to the living room to play. i went to the kitchen to do something, and no more than 2 minutes later, i hear a sound likened unto a pitcher of water being poured in my living room. it took me a minute to realize that it was pee! i ran into the living room to see a VERY shocked ethan standing with his legs spread wide peeing a very huge puddle of pee. welcome to potty training, mommy!!!!!!!!!!! (i was very glad that i'd rolled up my new area rug the night before!)

that was two minutes into the day. it was gonna be a long day. and it was. the first day was really hard. but 35 trips to the potty, 3 accidents all over the floor, and nine pairs of underwear later, we survived. the hardest part was my sweet, curious, bath-loving daughter that thought an open door to the bathroom was a signal that it was bathtime. plus she was just wondering what in the world was going on! so she spent several moments in her crib playing while ethan sat on the potty and i was cleaning up the carpet. in hindsight, i wish i would have taken her to someone's house for the morning. that would have made a world of difference, i think.

the logistics of the day went great. i started off at setting the timer for 10 minutes. that seems really short, but i knew it would take a little while to get in the routine of actually being able to pee on the potty, and i wanted to have more chances than not to catch him in a moment when he had to go. so every ten minutes, he had to sit on the potty. he didn't have to sit long, but long enough to try to go. just a minute or two. if he sat on the potty, he got a sticker. if he peed, he got 1 m&m. if he pooped, he got FIVE m&ms & FIVE stickers! the most effective part of this experience, i think, has been instilling the concept of being dry. every few minutes, i would ask him if he was dry (which meant staying very close to him and not getting much done last week). and if he was dry when the timer went off, he got an m&m before heading to the potty. this was huge motivation for him, and he really wanted to be dry for those m&ms! after the first day of 9 pairs of underwear, we went to 3 pairs the next day, and then only ONE PAIR each for the next few days! i was pretty proud of how quickly he got the hang of it! once he started showing that he was consistently dry after 10 minutes, and he wouldn't have to go everytime, we stretched the time to 15 minutes, and then 20... and so on. now, 10 days later, the timer is set for 35-45 minutes. and he is usually dry. and he goes every time. we haven't had another big accident on the floor since the second day. yay!!!! ethan will often tell me that he needs to go. he has figured out that this gets me out of bed in the morning or away from whatever i am doing. :) but hey, when a 2 year old tells you that he's gotta go, you've gotta believe him! !! now, going poo-poo still needs some refining, but i expected that. he went voluntarily one time last thursday, and i made a HUGE DEAL out of it. he called several people to tell them the good news (see picture to the right.) we are still working on getting to the bathroom in time to avoid messy pants, but he is at least telling me when it is happening. (too much info?? sorry!!!!) it's still much easier (and cheaper!) than changing diapers. i now only change 3 or 4 diapers a day! what a life! :) ha!

i will say that i did not go cold turkey w/ diapers at naptime and nighttime or for outings. (i know, sylvia, you told me too, but i just chickened out!) he has a totally dry diaper after a 3 hour nap or after we have been to the store or on a walk or something like that. he can really hold it. and he has gotten into the routine of going potty every night before bed (stalling tactic, i think, but hey, i'll take it!). he still has a pretty wet diaper in the morning, but that is one diaper a day vs. 4 or 5. so i calculated that one box of diapers from sam's will last us FIVE MONTHS vs. one month. wooohoooo! that is a huge reward for this potty trained momma!!!!

another huge blessing with this daunting task of potty training is that brian was home with the kids last tues & wed. morning. so after being worn-out for the first day of potty boot camp, i was able to take a little breather and give daddy the whistle. monday night, we sat on the couch, and we went over all the logistics. i think brian was honestly a little apprehensive about it all, but he did wonderfully with him. he was able to bring up some ideas i hadn't thought of, and i was so happy to share the task with daddy! then i took back over in the afternoons, as well as thurs & friday, and then i went out of town friday night for a ladies' church retreat (more on that later hopefully). so brian and i really were able to share the burden of potty training. that was a blessing i had not thought of but truly appreciated after the fact! :)

this has been really long winded. sorry. but after putting 80+ stickers on a potty chart, this momma's gotta share! i also know there are several of you that read my blog who have little boys not far behind ethan, and you would love to know my take on potty training. so here ya go! i feel like the way we did it really worked for ethan, but that by no means makes me an expert. (insert me laughing very loudly at myself!) i can't tell you how many mothers i quizzed for advice prior to monday, march 3. that is what we are all here for! so please learn from my mistakes. learn from what worked for us, learn from what didn't, and learn that you are gonna get pee on your carpet!

i will leave you with our potty training funnies...

-my mom and i keep referring to ethan's underwear as "pants" (hope, we could fit right in in scotland!)... and every time, ethan gets all flustered and says, "no no no mommy (or gram)! don't call them pants! call them underwear!" it just makes me laugh.

-ethan knows he gets 5 m&ms for going poo-poo in the potty, so almost evvvvvvvvvery time he has peed, he tries to strike a deal... he looks at me while he's sitting on the potty and says, in his most convincing voice, "fiiiiiiive m-a-m's???????". nope. sorry kid.

-so the time he actually made it to the potty and went poo-poo was huge. that was the 4th time in a period of 20 minutes that he ran to me to tell me that he had to go. the first time, he went and sat, and it was "just gas". the second time was nothing, the third time was pee, and the fourth time was the big kahuna. so after he finished, i let him look at his hard work in the potty. :) i made a big deal about it, and i exclaimed, "look at alllll the poo poo in the potty!" to which he exclaimed in reply, "AND GAS!"

well i think that's enough potty talk... now go wash your hands and get an m&m!

goodbye winter!!!!

i can think of no better way to enter the month of march than a day at the BEACH! last weekend, the kids and i enjoyed an absolutely beautiful day at the beach with my dad, joy, joy's son & daughter-in-law (dave & jen), and their two cute boys (matt & sam). dave & family were visiting last week from PA, and we sure do wish we were able to see them more often. ethan had so much fun with matt & sam... and fun uncle dave! :) brian stayed home to get a few things done around the house (remember the kitchen?? yep, still a work in progress!), but i still managed to take almost 200 pictures without him. :) and most of those were taken with caroline on my hip as we all walked down the beach. of course, if brian had been taking the pictures, he would remembered to change the settings off of tungsten lighting (for our living room), and several of the pictures (including the one above before i sort of fixed it) would not have been BLUE. but oh well... it's always something. :) back to our day at the beach!

we could not have asked for a more perfect day... it was breezy, slightly overcast at times and very sunny otherwise. the water was a bit cold, but that did not deter matt from splashing in it. ethan wanted to follow him into the water, but every time his feet accidentally touched the water, he came running, exclaiming, "the water got my feet wet!" that's amazing, son! :) i am happy to report that this year, ethan is already a-ok running around barefoot in the sand...however, caroline is not. i guess it just takes my kids a while to warm up to the idea of granules of sand all in their toes (they must get that from their daddy!). caroline is not one to miss out on any fun, so i can safely say that i think she will be burying herself in the sand by the end of the summer. :) she was also a bit clingy and "teething-y" on saturday, which might have had something to do with her not wanting to get in the sand. she was really easy to keep track of, though!

ethan's favorite part of the day was probably playing soccer with papa and grandma joy. he would play soccer allllllllll day if he had the chance! he also made & destroyed little sand castles, and we got great exercise walking up and down the beach looking for shells for matt & sam to take home with them. my favorite part of the day was the big fat piece of grilled fish that i ate for lunch at the beachside restaurant. :) this was a nice break from the sun, and there was a great little swingset for the kids to play on while we waited for our food. it was truly a wonderful day!

here are my favorite snapshots of the first beach day of 2008!

crushing sand castles with papa...
i wish i'd taken a video of this- ethan was laughing SO HARD!

northern boy matt splashing in the FRIGID water!

caroline posing like she's 8 months pregnant! ha!
she is not quite sure what to think about the beach just yet

this is my favorite picture from the day...
what an action shot! jen better move out of the way! :)

grandma joy & caroline relaxing after lunch

papa & grandma joy with their 3 grandsons

the only way i'd get all 3 boys in one picture looking at the camera!

caroline was about to drift off to sleep as i was swinging her

papa & ethan walking down the beach

this beach day really got me in the mood for warmer weather! i'm so thankful to live near such beautiful beaches... in the past few summers, we have not gone to the beach that often due to being hugely pregnant or having napping babies (but not newborns that sleep anywhere!). so i am hoping that this summer, we will be able to make up for all of that lost time! we gotta go appreciate God's creation!!! :)