my artists

nothing like a bright sunny Saturday morning to break out the art supplies! this is what my front porch looks like:

titled: Sesame Street

Afton really just wanted to paint. She's been asking for a week or so, and I finally said yes

Rayna isn't in her picture, but I thought it was GREAT!

titled: The Jurassic Time Period
and no, I had nothing to do with the picture or the name! she's brilliant ;)

Malachi thinks canvas is overrated... and paper

He was extremely proud of himself, note 4 colors, he correctly named them all, so I guess that's something :)

on the first day of kindergarten/1st grade...

my children gave to me

SMILES for all to see!

Afton's all ready for 1st grade!

they were so glad to know that they're only 2 classrooms apart in the same hall, so if they start to worry, they can remember that their sister's just a few feet away

Rayna was really excited to bring her lunch in her backpack

uniforms all around
ps, Paul shouldn't be outside without his hat!

in front of the school, and still smiling :)

Rayna found her desk and immediately started a picture

I forgot to get a picture of Afton at her desk, but she did great too... I can't wait to see them at the end of the school day... I hope they're still smiling :)

 

and because it was Malachi's first day without his sisters home to play with, I was rather impressed with how he kept busy. first, we had a later breakfast:

note that he eats with TWO spoons, he alternates hands as he goes... I still can't figure out why...

we also went on a long walk with the stroller and when we headed home for lunch, he set this up:

he also set up the vacuum so he could do the stairs for me, which was absolutely needed and helpful! I have a hard time reaching the stairs (or caring quite enough to do it when I'm sore). He's such a sweetheart!

I love my kids! smart, beautiful, and sweet!

so...

I know, I know, I'm horrible... but I've never seen 3D images of my babies before, and I've never had an ultrasound this close to delivery (aka, what he might actually look like) before... so here's for the fun of the comparison:

does he look like any of the others? (I'm assuming everyone can tell my kids apart, though the girls thought they were tricky--and I should know better than to assume anything by now...)

ps, sorry I can't figure out why the pics aren't aligned properly...

a few odds and ends to finish (nearly) up July

so one thing the girls have been asking me for is 'dreadlocks--the braid kind' (the fact that they know what those are and that there are other kinds almost worries me)... and since afton's been trying to grow out her bangs and I HATE when they are constantly falling in her face, I decided it was well worth the effort to have a week free of doing her hair! (and her undoing it so it falls right back in her face...)

TA-DA! (those front braids took forever)

rayna's were pretty lopsided... I guess I made the top ones too big and the bottom ones too small... if you're ever doing this, make the opposite mistake if you must do them uneven ;)

malachi stole my kitchen rug one day... I just liked the pic, sorry it's so blurry...

while paul was gone for so long, I frequently let malachi go to sleep in my bed, it was easier, and he's still pretty easy to move too... but this night when I went to move him back I couldn't help but laugh... he'd built a complete nest of pillows all the way around himself, and he used his beloved blankie as a pillow, because the last pillow was his blanket...

sleepy birdy

and the absolute HIGHLIGHT of the summer, DADDY CAME HOME!!!

midnight at the airport, the kids holding a banner that reads 'welcome home dad'

and after the braids came out

both girls loved their 'lion manes'

and since daddy's birthday was while he was at training, we had cake with him after he came home

yum! trifle :)

and I already put this one on FB, but it's too cute not to share again in case anyone missed it!
lawn mower boys

Some more parks...

Okay, I know I'm getting into the realm of boring now, but I figure I may as well post a few more pictures because I have them :). We visited a couple parks that are super close to our new house right when we moved in, and we were horribly disappointed. We have since learned that there are nice parks too, and that has been a GREAT discovery for my climber-kids. One is just over a mile, so we can walk it (as long as traffic isn't too bad), and the other is just a 10-15 minute drive, so it still seems reasonable for this area.

so, a few pictures from our new parks:

a T-rex built for three

climbing and playing! hooray!

someone's feeling flexible!
(they thought they were fooling me, I thought it was cute)

happy kids, it was hard to get them to leave, even though there's no bathroom at this park ;)

the kids borrowed the camera, and evidentially took it outside when I wasn't looking. more pics with our hole.

and this playground was really HUGE! I didn't take too many pictures though...

swinging...

and a dolphin? I'm not sure what it was, but the kids liked it. there's also a pretty little lake here,

and a tiny nature center, see the owl in the background?

koi

Beach Day!

One of the first things the kids asked about when we figured out where we were moving was if there's a beach. Specifically, they wanted to go beach-camping. We haven't been able to manage that one yet (I think I'm too pregnant for that one right now), but we did take a morning at Chesapeake Bay, not quite the ocean, but close enough (literally, it was only a 30 minute drive, that's close!). I think we had a pretty successful trip, despite a little sunburn for me (it's hard to spray your own back!), and a bit of excitement for Afton...

we were especially excited to play with our new sand toys from Grandma W

break time--after swimming/wading all morning. the shore was pretty steep into the deep, dark water, so we stayed pretty close to the beach.

lookin' pretty! despite the bright glare of the sun.

more sandcastle-ing and a big river/moat/creek thing from the berm into the water.

push-ups in the water anyone?

as the tide started coming I, we saw LOTS of these guys... LOTS.
so our swimming/wading was severely curtailed as we tried to prevent

this! Afton managed to get stung just the same, and she kept rubbing sand on it, which made me worry it would get scraped raw and hurt later... come to find out, one of the best 'remedies' for jellyfish sting is to rub sand on it, it helps to get microscopic stingers out so they stop hurting sooner! way to go Afton! We also applied vinegar to it when we got home, and by 24 hours later it was nearly imperceptible, and later the next afternoon it didn't even hurt at all

Needless to say, that was about enough of the water for me! so we had our picnic lunch and played on the playground for a while:

I didn't even know they made these anymore!

Rayna was happy to climb around for a while

Malachi loved jumping, it was made of metal so the thumps were satisfyingly loud.

I liked the general pirate theme of the play area, even if it was a bit small

then we took a walk along the relatively short beach, climbing on rocks and playing just in the edge of the water, as long as we could see no jellyfish.

there are tons of these zebra swallowtails around here, we liked watching them play at the beach

needless to say, the excavator was also pretty exciting. We look forward to visiting the beach again, maybe at the end of jellyfish season! we also know now to pay attention to when the tide should be coming in/out so as to minimize jelly-contact.

there was also a little pier at the other end of the beach where we met some 'big' boys crabbing with their dad, it was exciting to see the bucket of crabs they'd caught, so now the kids all want to go crabbing with Daddy at some time in the next year... though R & M were careful to point out that they want to help catch the crabs, but NOT eat them :) we'll see...