a belated birthday wish to my lovely aunt

happy belated birthday, aunt peggy. great big hugs to you from all of us.

we hope you get over that nasty flu & feel better real soon too. we love you bunches & bunches. when you are up for it, party at papaw's!

maybe our future homesite..

here's some pictures from daddio's trek on "the land" saturday. there's some pretty pretty views, as gracie would say.

a nice big lake


lots of room to roam



some woods


i really liked the looks of this creek. this spot may be the neighbor's land though.


lots of wildlife. he saw some deer and turkey while exploring in the woods. i don't know if i'm ready for all the bugs.

fingers crossed we can get it...

my sweet dinosaur

ben changed his mind from being a samuri guy to just having to be a t-rex for halloween. at a consignment sale this weekend, i found him the perfect costume. he was super eggsited (excited in benglish) to put it on & scare his daddy with it. he was too fast for me to take a picture. but little sis gladly modeled it, dirty face & all.

field trip take 2

today was the rescheduled field trip to tj's apple orchard for ben's preschool class. what a wet & rainy day we had! ben & his classmates getting on the bus. the bus worked.



fortunately, most of the field trip was inside, where the kiddos learned about how they pick & sort the apples and make cider. johnny appleseed's sister taught the kiddos all about apples today. she asked them why she might carry a big stick with her & ben piped up "to hit at doggies you see when you go for a walk." i do that..(sometimes i carry a big stick to ward off the neighbor's german shepard at the end of block that has already bitten neighbor john)

i was so impressed with all the kiddos today; they were so well behaved! here is ben & his friend listening to joanna appleseed.

our short jaunt in the rain to check out some apple trees. poor ben really wanted to pick some apples from a real tree, we will have to do that soon.

pretty pretty sunglasses

poppy, gracie wants her sunglasses back.. please.....


(poppy, it was you son's idea to put this picture on here) i love you!

happy belated birthday to one of our girls!

ben (& gracie) has 3 cousins that he just loves. he calls them his "girls." the youngest, miss allison just turned 14. she is such a sweet young lady. it makes me feel super old that she is already 14, she acts much older than that! i remember when she was born & her growing up through the years. she's always been a loving girl, beautiful inside and out. here's the lovely birthday gal..
5 years ago at our wedding

& today!!

we went over to visit with "the girls" today after papaw's.
gracie got some good cuddle time in with aubrie.

allie showed us one of her birthday presents. these are shoes with toes in them. the things they have nowadays! i guess they are used for rock climbing & water activities. kindy funky..

the girls have loads of games to play. today, we played chinese checkers and slap happy. this game rocks. how fun are these big foam hands? in the game, you roll a dice & try to slap on that color circle first. it's a game from when miss allie was a kiddo & now my kiddos get to learn & play with it.

thanks allie & aubrie for such a wonderful afternoon! we love you girls, keep on being so lovely & awesome. happy belated birthday to you, miss allison!!

looking fine at 79!

papaw turned 79 today! happy birthday!!

what a year he's had! it's been up & down, but he's been fighting a good fight. i'm proud of him. i've learned a lot from him over the years, especially this past one. he never complained about how he was feeling or the chemo or the surgery, just did it. he taught me a lot about inner strength & how i need to toughen up a bit.

what did papaw want for his birthday?? a snuggie, of course.



i told him we'd save his candles for his 97th birthday. he chuckled.




after cake & ice cream, we sat outside in the pouring rain & watched the kiddos play in their sunday best. pretty good entertainment those kids are.



i think papaw had a good birthday with us. i'm glad we got to share it with him. i love my pap.

feeling froggy

we all went out back today to work on the cement pond. we are getting ready to close it up after a summer of fun. the pool was quite icky today, a nice shade of algae green. we have not been keeping up with the maintenance over the past 2 weeks, procrastinating closing it. so, it has become a new home for many frogs from the pond.

miss gracie was thrilled to see them swimming around. daddio caught her one & she loved it & pet it & squeezed it & named it hoppy.

we caught 2 for ben that he has in a special "aquarium" that he can hopefully take them to show & tell. he was not so much into holding or even touching the little jumpers like his sis.

the kiddos had the best time with their frogs - ben making a habitat for his new pets & gracie holding onto hers for dear life. until the inevitable happened... hoppy jumped...

but, never fearo, daddio was able to track him down with his expert frog hunting skills & get a hoppy back for gracie.
everything & everyone is now happy again in our household. thank you daddio!

wanted: a new baby sister

ben announced he wanted a new baby, as he has taught this one everything already. he wants it to be a girl & he will name her gracie.
i think there is only room for one miss gracie faye in our family!

daddio told ben if he wanted another baby in the family, he'd have to be a big boy & start sleeping in his own bed. ben said we could all sleep with him in there then. my kid's a thinker!

our favorite animals at the zoo

no preschool today, so the kiddos & i went to the zoo.
ben spent most of the time saying "come on guys!" he's always ready to make it to his favorite things at the zoo...

gracie, on the other hand, was taking time to smell each & every flower along the way (she was trying to pick them all too)

we made it to the giraffes. my favorite. up there with the kiddos too because they get so close to you.
ben even petted it today.

i think he's smiling at me!

the kiddos playing on the giraffe statue. gracie just loved hugging & petting the statue for some reason today.

that giraffe is such a friendly guy. i sure do like him.

our next stop were the sea otters. the kiddos looove getting in the underwater tube & watching the otters swim all around. i think the entire zoo could hear their squeals of delight watching the otters.

after the otters, we called it a day, as they were tired of walking & very hungry. we ate at the zoo cafe, which wasn't half bad. the kids really enjoyed their icecream dots!

now what to do for the weekend???

on my, i mean my kiddos, wish list

we love our building sets around here. we've got lots... magnatiles(our favorite right now), abc blocks, foam blocks, big cardboard blocks, big foam blocks that velcro together, wedgits (a close second favorite), bristle blocks, and even some i can't think of at this time. the kiddos play with whatever sets are available to them everyday (we do a toy rotation & sometimes toys are in the basement). i think you can't go wrong with blocks. blocks can do & be so many things. both of our kiddos just love to build, build build.

i discoverd some new blocks on the market that look super cool! they are called tegu blocks. quite a bit pricey, but look oh so fun! there are magnets inside of the blocks, so the kiddos can build in all sorts of new ways. this company also looks like one of those "green" type companies (if that's the proper classifaction). for a set of blocks you buy, you have the option of sending a Honduran child to school for a day or planting a tree. pretty cool

when their facebook fan base reaches 1000, they are having some special, so let's rack up those #'s folks! (i'm hoping for a temporary price drop, or a giveaway - keeping my fingers crossed)

i think these are definately going on mine, i mean the kiddos wish list for christmas!

ben's first field trip

what a big day for ben... his first field trip! to an apple orchard. he really wanted daddio to go, but said i could come with him. siblings aren't allowed to go, so miss gracie was off at karen's playing, having her own field trip/playdate. she had a blast over there. thanks karen!
here he is waiting in line to get on the bus. look at all those cuties!

climbing up the bus, oh boy! the bus was going to be one of our highlights, as we've been watching the heck out of the magic shcoolbus around here.

the bus was the highlight of the trip, as after the kiddos were all seated, the driver started it up & the engine made a funny noise. so off go the kiddos. the driver was unable to fix it that day, so they had to reschedule for next week.

momma melissa suggested we take the kiddos to a different local orchard after school just to look around. this orchard used to rock. there were animals, a corn maze, apple cider slushies, all sorts of goodness. not so much anymore. but the kids still had fun. & got apples..



hope everyone has a funtastic week!

pimping daddy's ride

the kiddos love hanging out in the back of daddio's truck. the kiddos & i had just got back from a walk this evening when daddio pulled in from work. so, we all jumped in the truck.

gracie begged for some chalk & the kiddos had the best time decorating up the truck for daddy in "pretty pretty" (as gracie says) colors.




i think daddio will have the prettiest truck in the lot at work tomorrow!
(daddy's hoping for rain)