Long Day

This is what a long day looks like...

 

An Interjection

At the breakfast table this other morning...

Caroline:  Mama.  Mama.

Me:  Yes.

Caroline:  When I was.  When I was.  When I was... When I was...  When I was in your tummy.  ... ... ... ... I kicked...

Howard:  You kicked me!

I'm not sure what Caroline intended to say because we were all laughing so hard with Howard's very accurate interjection.

Through the Eyes of Caroline

At the end of the day yesterday, as I began to look through pictures to possibly include in that day's blog post, I found that apparently Caroline got a hold of my camera during the day yesterday and my phone was filled with some of her artistic photos.

I'm sure if an adult took these pictures, they would be in some gallery as artistic expression of daily life simplicity...

 

Oh Yeah...

I saw this a few days ago and it made me laugh out loud.  I often comment to people that I never feel farther from Jesus than I do trying to get my family out the door in time for church on Sundays.

 

Hands Full

And people tell me I have my hands full... I'm no where near as busy as Caroline.

She's got five baby dolls and a baby monkey napping and she's busy packing everyone for a trip.

 

Message?

I'm sorry she can't come to the phone right now, can I take a message?

I'll make a note on my calendar.

 

Men Doing Men Work

Just men doing men work on these snowy mornings...

 

Happy 5th Birthday Tracey Ann!

Wow... Five years ago this baby girl entered the world.

She is such a character.

This child feels things so acutely.  Her highs are so high and her lows are very low.  She always puts herself in charge of her younger siblings whether they want her to be in charge or not.  For better or for worse, she copies so many of my behaviors and has made herself quite the little mother this year.

She is such a social child and often puts herself in charge, not only of her siblings, but of her entire group of friends.

This year, she has taken a bigger interest in books and learning her letter sounds, and is working very hard to understand geography, math, and calendars.

A few weeks ago she received a jewelry box from a family member and since receive that gift, seemingly overnight she became interested in clothes, hair styles, and accessories.  This child that never cared about the clothes I laid out for her to wear suddenly insists on dresses that sparkle and twirl along with necklaces, bracelets, and bows.

As our oldest child, Tracey has such a special place in our family.  Every first that she hits, is a first for us as her parents too. While we do our best in every circumstance, she has experienced more trial and error of our parenting than her younger siblings have.

We are so lucky to be her parents and I can't wait to see how she grows and develop this coming year.

 

Way Back Wednesday

Is Way Back Wednesday a thing?

If so... here is a Way Back Wednesday from the Winter of 1998 when I was in the middle school production of The Nifty Fifties...

 

Family Movie Night

We had a family movie night the night before my birthday...

As you can see, a great time was had by all.

 

Fun Pics

When both Tracey and Caroline end up wearing Mama's old dresses to church on the same day... we take some fun pictures...

 

Two Years

2016

2018

 

10 On 10

10 On 10 for January... I pretty much forgot to take pictures most of the day... so I actually have only 10 pictures.

 

Aging Challenge

Facebook has started an Aging Challenge and I've seen it a few different ways -- post two pictures side by side, one from ten years ago and one from present day.  The other challenge I've seen is posting your first ever Facebook profile picture next to your current Facebook profile picture.

So... Aging Challenges accepted:

 Just kidding...

2009 - I had JUST moved to Colorado

2019

First Facebook Profile Picture (and this is off of memory because Facebook history does not go back far enough to retrieve many of my profile pictures from before 2006... and I joined Facebook in Fall of 2004 -- I remember because I was studying abroad in Rome when Facebook came W&L (my American University) so there are several years of profile pictures lost in the recesses of unaccounted for Facebook history.

Current Facebook Profile Picture 

Thank you, Lord for all these years You've given me.

Focus

My focus for this day... and probably this week... month... maybe even year.

 

 

 

1000 Words

1000 Words

 

Daddy's Way

When Daddy's in charge of bedtime, I never know what's going to happen...

I love Caroline's face in this progression as she tries to copy Tracey