Farewell Little Brother, Farewell

Jake's youngest brother Levi is going on a mission for our church to Las Vegas, Nevada. He goes into the MTC (Missionary Training Center) on May 7th. Many know that these missions are for two years, which means we won't see him again for a long long time! We are so proud of him and know that his life will be blessed a million times for this great decision he has made, but we will also miss him. He really is like a real brother to me as he is the brother-in-law I have spent the most time with, and Jake will be lost this NFL season without Levi here to talk about the Saints. I thought it would be fun to first post some pictures I have of Levi through the years...

Levi and Elle with matching hair.

Levi, Elle, and crawfish.

Jake and Levi (and might I add, those are some really pretty dresses you got there!)

Jake and Levi

Oh wait, that's not Levi! I just think this picture of Jake and Paul is hilarious and I want to take the opportunity to post it as often as I can!

Levi, Jake, and Paul building Elle's toy for Christmas.

Jake, Levi, Pops, and Paul in Notre Dame's football stadium.

Levi winning state.

Jake, little Levi, and Paul at our wedding.

Pops, Levi, Jake, and Paul going golfing. This tradition has obviously been going on for some time.

And while we're posting old pics, check out this cute baby here. I saw the picture with the white background the other day and couldn't believe how much Elle and Jada look alike! Jada really is a tanner, darker thinner haired, more mild tempered version of her big sis!

All right, enough with the flashbacks. Because Levi is leaving soon, we went out to visit him in Louisiana. He gave a farewell talk at church on Sunday, and I was a little upset they didn't ask me to sing a parting solo for him or anything. It would have been really good. He did a great job on his talk and we had a yummy potluck lunch afterwards. Jake's sister Jessica also was in town so we got to spend some time with her. Jake got off work around noon on Friday so we picked him up from downtown and headed out. We got into Luling around 6 that night and got home late Monday night. We had such a great time and always love hanging out with the family!

The weather was a bit rainy on Saturday so golfing couldn't happen for the boys. Instead we opted for bowling which is always great because I am basically a professional scoring at least in the upper 40's (actually I don't know what my scores were, but I'm sure they weren't much better than that. I was just happy to hit pins.) The girls had fun even though all the bumpers were in use. Elle was getting a little sad when she kept getting it in the gutter but Jake eventually figured out a good strategy and they were successful in knocking over some pins.

Saturday also happened to be "Christmas" (as Jake and Levi refer to it) in the form of the NFL draft. Here they are below in position to watch the draft which luckily for them could be seen on the TV at the bowling alley. Jake of course had to sport the Saints shirt. Better than the mullet-man shirt Levi had on, that's for sure!


Saturday night we went out to eat at a yummy restaurant called Stingrays where the draft also happened to be playing. I'm sure you can guess what the conversations were about down at my half of the table. And just to show my expert skills in mothering and teaching manners to my children I post this picture of Mya below. She said, "Take a picture of me gargling." Maybe we need to work on those manners a little more.

The girls got to have a fun sleepover with their aunts on Saturday night. Jessica was so tired from her all night airport adventures so it worked out great. Notice Elle with the blankets over her head.

And here's a couple of pictures from church on Sunday after Levi's farewell.




I had to take this picture to show the view from one of the doors of the church house. Louisiana really is a beautiful swampy place that everyone should visit. Jake's parents live on a golf course with trees and spanish moss hanging everywhere. There is a pond so close to their house with alligators that I actually saw this time. If that's not exciting I don't know what is.

Above is a pic of little Boo Boo practicing her walking skills which are getting better and better. And below is not Nacho Libre. I know you thought it was. It's just Jake traumatizing Jada with that scary looking thing. I'm telling you the baby was terrified. She was screaming. It was sad and funny all at the same time. And then to prolong the terror Elle and Mya each wanted a turn with the mask.


The trip ended Monday with a family traditional golf outing for the boys. They were two brothers short but still had fun. I like the mustang in the background. That is the family car that has been around since Jake was in high school. Jake and I even drove it for awhile after we got married and now it's back in the family still going strong even though it's missing rims.

Now, back to the home front... Elle continues to learn on the two wheeler. She is doing awesome and will just keep getting better with practice. Starting is still a problem, as with stopping sometimes, and occasionally we still run into things, but overall she's doing great.

The girls have started a new exercise regime in preparation for swimsuit season of an hour a day on the treadmill. And I promise Mya does own clothes besides swimsuits. It seems like she's been featured in one a lot lately.


Elle and Mya did a little bit of painting today along with playing in the pool. I thought it might be fun to let Jada have a try at the old wading pool. I think she's still a little undecided on whether of not it was fun but give her time and she'll come around I think. She better or it'll be a long summer if she's not a fan of the pool!



I love this last picture of her standing showing off her little chubby thighs! She really is picking up on this whole walking thing and is slowly improving. Crawling and cruising are still the main forms of movement for her but she's not afraid to take some steps either. When she couldn't roll over and was almost six months old I really wouldn't have thought that she'd be walking by 10 months but she surprised me! Besides all this stuff above I'm looking forward to next week when my sissy comes for a little visit to the great big state of TX. It's going to be great.

By Popular Demand...

Apparently the tutus are a hit. If you're feeling a bit crafty, here's a rundown on how they are made. I'll try to explain it the best I am able.

Supplies:

5 to 6 yards of tulle per skirt (preferably the soft, not scratchy kind. And if you are doing a multi-colored one, get 3 yards of each color.)

1 inch strip of elastic (for the waistband)

And that is about it, unless you wanted to get fancy and add ribbon, a flower, etc. You can be as creative as you want.

What to do:

Measure waist of tutu wearer and cut elastic band to fit accordingly (leave a little extra for overlap when sewing).

Stacy then sewed the ends of the elastic together to form a waist band. If you don't have a sewing machine like me, you could probably just stitch it together really well.

Next, cut tulle in 3 to 4 inch strips. It usually comes folded in half off the bolt, so leave it that way for cutting (this way it's doubled up, which means less cutting for you). After cutting the strips, cut each in half along the fold so the strips aren't too long.

Lastly, place the elastic band around your knee and get busy attaching the tulle. You can either tie the strips on, or loop them. To loop is a bit tricky to explain in writing (make the tulle strip like a "U" behind the elastic and then loop ends around front of elastic through the "U". Like I said, hard to explain. If you can't figure it out, I'm sure tying works just fine.) If you're doing multicolored, rotate every other one.

So that should be about it. They're really cheap and easy. Tulle is like 97 cents a yard. Hopefully that makes sense to all inquiring tutu-making readers. Let me know if there are any questions!

Playing with some pink tool, or is it tulle???

To show how non-fabric oriented I am, we will refer to the below shown fabric as tool, although I think it must be spelled tulle because that's how my friend Rosaline spelled it. Anyways, awhile back I had mentioned some tooly skirts that I wanted to make for my girlies. I'm not the craftiest of things, but I can cut and loop tool like no other. Actually, I think Stacy wins the fastest looping prize, and thanks to her, I now have three fluffy tool skirts, which, of course, are pink. Could we really have it any other way??

While I don't often frequent the fabric section of stores, I found it fun checking out all the fancy colors of tool Wal-Mart had to offer. We met at Stacy's, with tool and elastic in hand, along with my handy sewing scissors from senior year of high school, and were prepared to be crafty.

It really was quite easy to do, which is why I even had contemplated this task in the first place. Luckily Stacy is handy with her little sewing machine and sewed the elastic waist bands quite nicely. Besides that little bit of sewing, all that was really required was cutting strips of tool, and more strips of tool, and more strips of tool, and then looping them onto the elastic waist band. The finished products were really cute, as can be seen below. I like that even the boys wanted in on the dressing-up fun. I mean, who doesn't want to run around in a fluffy tutu??

Below are my three skirts. Elle got the light pink one, which was my first one. It's not my favorite because I think I went a little skimpy on the tool, but it's still cute enough. Stacy looped and cut most of the bright pink one for Mya, which is fluffy and so great. And Jada got the mixed variety, with both light and dark pink. I think I'll use them for the girls pictures when Jada turns one. Ours were really simple, but you could fancy them up a bit by tying ribbon or sparkly tool or attaching a flower to the front.

And besides sporting a fancy new look, Elle has been learning some things of note lately. She was so excited to learn to snap a little bit ago and wanted to show lots of people. She also learned to pump on the swings at the park, with only a little help getting started. We also took on the two-wheeler for the first time Saturday night. She did great! I'm amazed at how quickly they pick things up. She still needs lots of practice, but for the first go round I was really impressed.

I had to capture this moment below. Ignoring the fact that Mya's in her swim suit, I wanted to show all the girlies playing together. Any mom knows that this doesn't happen often and doesn't last for long, but I love it when I can get them to play together.

The heat is here which meant it was time to bring out the old wading pool from the garage. That pool has been worth every cent that Jake's mom spent on it. It provided many hours of entertainment last year when we were housebound with a newborn and did not disappoint today.

And you know I'm getting desperate for help around here when I have my three year old feeding my baby. I was in need of an extra set of hands, and she did a pretty good job.

She also took on the liberty of getting herself a little snack.

I wanted to show one of our "junk" spots in the house below. This isn't exactly junk. It's more of a holding spot for a lot of my girlies little arts and crafts they make. I feel bad throwing them away right away so here some of them rest until I decide what to do with them.

Jada took a couple of steps today. I don't think she's close to walking, but it was fun to see. Maybe she'll surprise us and pick up on it. Or maybe it could have been a fluke. She also took a great almost three hour afternoon nap today. I feel bad for her sometimes because she rarely gets two good naps a day in her crib. Her morning nap often gets shorted as we are running around here and there or she takes a little one in the car. Oh well, I guess that's life when you're a third child!

Spring Dinosaurs

We had preschool at my house today and I decided to talk about dinosaurs. There are a couple boys in the group and I knew they would like the topic, and Elle had learned about dinos the week before in preschool and she surprisingly really enjoyed it. As I'm sure you can guess, dino items are in short supply around our home. The only toy dinosaur we have went missing in action today so Mya couldn't even bring it to show-n-tell. Everyone brought dino related items. Here are the little ferocious dinosaurs. I know you're scared. I love Spencer's (in green) face in this first one.


Here's Jada checking out a triceratops brought by one of the boys. It was large. At first I thought she was scared of it. But she may have just been sad because I left her. It seems to be a common theme around here nowadays.

We made dinosaur tracks on paper. I couldn't convince one of the boys to let us paint his foot and step on paper so he just free-handed one with the paint.

We also did a little digging for dinosaur bones (really plastic animals) in a pan of oatmeal. Messy, but they had fun.

To show Mya's sweet side I share this quote. Her friend Emma had come in from the backyard crying because she had gotten hurt. Mya told her, "Come on Emma. Do you want me to hold your hand so nobody does anything to you?" Oh it was all going so well until I realized Mya and Emma were doing this to the trampoline. Apparently with kids you can't have anything nice. I think it's a rule.

This week the weather has been the greatest! So nice and springlike and no humidity! It is so wonderful. And great weather equals great hair, meaning I can flat iron my hair and it actually stays straight. I love it. I also wish I had a screen door because I love to have the door open when the weather is nice.

Since I don't have a food producing garden to brag about (maybe someday, maybe) I have to show my pretty spring flowers that are blooming around the yard. These pretty white ones show up once a year on our big bushes and smell really good.

These yellow lily things bloom once a year and if you look to the right you'll see the brownish-red leaf poking through the mulch. My mom planted those last year and they are coming back.

I also have a love-hate relationship with this plant below (the green low bush with a few yellow flowers). It grows out of control and needs to be trimmed up a lot, but it adds color and the butterflies like the flowers which is fun for the girls.

Almost last flower related item- we went on a walk this afternoon to enjoy some nature and the pretty weather. Some flowers were picked, fire ant hills disturbed (purposely by me- just keeping things exciting), and we also got to check out a dead worm being eaten by ants. What's more exciting than that? Not much. I tried to show off my flower-chaining skills only to find they aren't as good as they once were. Apparently I'm about 15 years out of practice.

After the walk we tried to observe the birds that I think have a nest in our little tree. I'm proud that the tree actually has enough substance to house a nest considering it's still pretty puny. You can kind of see it below. The girls got bored after awhile because the birds didn't come back so we bailed and went inside.

The girls also took a little time to do some bird watching today and drew what they found.

Now for just a little bit of kid art- I like to put up some of the cute stuff on my pantry door. Another place we display artwork is on big bulletin boards in our laundry room, thanks to my mom. She's so smart.

Elle made this cute house at preschool today. I like it that the whole family is there, even Bubblegum Girl the fish who just may be the world's longest living pet fish ever.

Onto me, I'm thoroughly enjoying Spring for the week (because next week the heat is coming), especially the nice straight hair. Not enjoying the increase in bugs it brings (spiders, lovebugs, cockroach in Jada's room the other night- sick sick sick) but loving all the chirping birds and open window weather. I love all the flowers and feel like we are lucky because even though our backyard is boring, our neighbor behind us has some pretty landscaping which we can see. I'm so glad we can steal some of their beauty. Anyways, I'm really liking "The Goose Girl". Shannon Hale writes some good stuff. Read it if you're bored.

And last is little Jada who is now 10 months old! So crazy. I'm feeling sad that we are nearing the one year mark which also means the end of nursing and baby food. Sad about the baby food thing because it's so easy and I'm lazy. Sad about the nursing thing because I love the break it provides me from life. I am forced to sit down and read or close my eyes or whatever. In a life of crazies, it is heavenly. Oh how I'll miss it come June.

Lastly, this Friday is my Sister #3's birthday. So this is a little poem, written with love for her, by Sister #2:

Kirstie, Kirstie, you are my sister.

If you run on your birthday, don't get a blister.

Although you'll be 21, please don't drink and drive.

Actually, don't drink at all, and don't play in beehives.

Please come to Texas, we all miss you so.

We have cowboys and accents and not any snow.

Please try to have fun on your special day.

I'd be there, I would, if Texas weren't so far away.

This poem can be my replacement, hang it on your wall.

To remind you I'm the greatest sister, of all, of all.

Thank you for your time. I can write you a birthday poem too, if you'd like. I only charge $100 a line.