Independence Day

We love holidays around here.  And traditions as well.  One of our favorites is making our annual 4th of July shirts.  This year's might just be my favorite ones ever.  I got 20 of the baseball shirts at a garage sale for $5 (weirdly enough, they "fit" everyone from a 10 year old, down to 4 year old Sam... Brooke was a lot too tall though...)  and we cut the sleeves and tie-dyed the bottom half, then the girls got to paint the top.  

 One of my favorite pictures ever.  We call these girls the triplets...

 Bike/roller blade parade

 We had our annual 4th of July party at our house.  10 families (with an average of 4 kids each...) came over and played.  We set up the street with a bunch of rubbermaid totes and fill them with water for the water fight.  Alix turned one of them into her personal hot tub while waiting for people to come.

 Start of the water fight....  Easing the littles in...  

 Erin loading up

 No mercy for the pregnant lady...

 I LOVE this picture of Brooke and Tom.  Refilling the water cannons

 Start of the silly string fight...

 After dinner we always play bump/lightening/speed (whatever you grew up calling it...)  This year it was fun because a lot of the girls (we have mostly girls in our group...) played basketball this year and were good enough to have a chance at getting their dads out.  And a few did.  Highlight of their day, I tell you!  And I won one of the rounds.  Kind of amazing.  And fun...

 Some of the kids set up a firework viewing station in the neighbor's driveway.  We'll assume they didn't mind, since they didn't come out and yell at us...

 The annual Hobo Fire.  Another fun, weird tradition.  The kids collect all the cardboard fireworks garbage and then light it on fire in the middle of the street and then sit around it.  Like hobos apparently...

 I told the girls to take in all the blankets from the driveway at the end of the night and this is how we found Alix a few minutes later... It's a good day when you fall asleep the second you sit down...

Garden 2013

For once, we got our garden in early.  We had some really hot, sunny days and it got us (and by us - I absolutely mean Tom and the girls...) motivated.  So by the end of April, our entire garden was planted.    Tom built a raised bed on the grass level and then we continued our Aztec tradition of planting our hill...

I do love a good family project that gets everyone working together.  So far it's been really fun exposing the neighborhood kids to garden fare.  A surprising number of kids have never heard of radishes.  It's fun to watch their faces when they realize radishes are spicy.... ;)  It's still early for harvesting here, but we've had lettuce, spinach, cilantro, strawberries and radishes.   I love "shopping" from my backyard!  And hopefully we got our tomatoes in early enough to get them to ripen.  Our "hot" season isn't very hot usually and isn't very long either...  And I only garden for the tomatoes.  Oh, and because our Prophet told us too...

Quote of the Day...

We were at the twin's track meet last night and while waiting with them at the long jump pit, it started raining.  Pretty hard rain.  Sam crouched down in front of me and I asked her what she was doing...

"Duh, mom. I'm hiding from the rain under your belly!"

 Of course you are.  On a baby note, this little (still nameless) man will born on July 18th at 9am.  So at least my built in rain shelter won't be around too much longer...

Pinkwood Derby 2013

Once again, our ward did a Pinkwood Derby for all the 8-11 year-old girls.  (Our ward must have the coolest primary president ever...)  This is the second year we've done it and this year, Tom had three cars to help build.  Good thing Pop Pop was there to lend a hand.

Pop Pop and Alix

 Brooke let Sam help with her sanding

 Mad genius at work...

 Cool sawdust shot of Erin blowing off her car

 We had smaller numbers this year, lots of the girls were out of town, but it went really smoothly and everyone got to race a lot of times.

 Erin is the only one of my girls who came to the photo booth at the end.  I'll have to take some more pictures of the other girl's cars and post them later.  They were pretty sweet.  Erin's car was so skinny she and Tom  had to use fishing weights on the top to make it heavy enough.  So she made them heads...

 And instead of ding dong medals, we gave the girls twinkie cars for an award.  I'm not sure who's Sam stole, but it's the only one we got a picture of... 

And, by the way, Alix took first place this year!  Nicely done.  Nicely done.

Not Excited At All...

My friend gave us some little boy clothes.  About 12-18 months size.  The girls couldn't wait to see what it would look like on...

I hope they look better on the boy...

Blogger Blahs....

Maybe I'm just in a holding pattern waiting for this baby to come...  Maybe I just haven't been downloading the pictures off my camera...  I don't really know, but life seems surprisingly un-blog worthy lately.  Boring.   But here are a few snapshots of our spring...

Playing street tennis

 Can you see Erin behind me?  She was copying my killer serve pose...

 We made chalk paint.  It's awesome.  You should totally try it.  Cornstarch and water and food coloring.  

 It gets brighter as it dries and stays for days...

 And can double as body paint.  But apparently it itches once it dries all over you...

 We've made some epic cities in our "circle".  I do the roads and the girls add stores and houses.

 We chalked our tree.  Also something you should try.  Start by soaking some sidewalk chalk in water.

 Then rub it all over the tree and brush over it with a paintbrush dipped in water.  Weeks later, of WA rain and people still ask why our tree is blue...  

 Lots of bike rides.  I look awesome following this bunch of gals around.  We kind of look like a (really friendly) gang...

 Feeding the ducks...

The girls are still in school until June 19th, so we really are in the mode of waiting.... Waiting for summer, waiting for baby, waiting for better weather, just waiting...  But we're having fun waiting...

A Little Heartbreaking / A Lot of Wonderful

On the way to Activity Days yesterday I got to listen to a wonderful conversation.  We were giving a neighbor girl a ride and she has a three week old baby brother.  Which led to the girls talking about themselves when they were born.  Sam calmly said, "I was born with medical problems."  It was kind of interesting listening to the twins and Sam explaining, in their own terms, what's "wrong" with Sam.  They have a pretty good handle on what's going on.  Sam, in this chipper, happy voice announced, "I'm going die when I'm a teenager!"  (I have no idea where or when she decided teenager is it for her.  We've talked a lot about the fact her life might be shorter than most - but I have never given her an expiration date...)  The neighbor was kind of shocked and I just kept listening and staying out it.  Sam then said, "I hope I die really fast. I don't want to miss my family."  (Oh, Sam.  We don't want to miss you either...)  But this led to the wonderful part of the conversation.  The twins and their friend quietly reassured Sam that if she is lucky enough to die before the rest of us, she will get to see Jesus first. "How great will that be?"  

I am continually amazed by the depth of understanding of children.  I am thankful for the knowledge that we have of eternal families.  We have be sealed together for time and all eternity and belong to each other forever.  Good byes are not forever.  Some of us just get to be with Jesus longer than others. I cannot write this without tears streaming down my face.  I cannot imagine life here without Sam.  I cannot imagine life here without the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  I know it's true.  I know it's real.  

(And really, Sam is doing great.  She's not anywhere near dying, any time soon...  sorry for the heavy post, it just seemed like something I needed to say...)