Campout

A little catch-up on the last few weeks.  We got to babysit Joce.  She certainly does not lack for attention when she is here.  =)

   

Kate loves to hold babies and was so excited when one afternoon Bethany said, “Kate, do you want to hold Reid?”

Our generous neighbor’s gave us a bike their son had outgrown, so Creighton got Lincoln’s old bike.  He is doing great on it.

We went to Indiana to visit Mike’s cousin and her family.  Thank you for your hospitality!  We enjoyed being with you all and thanks for the pictures. =)

   

We also enjoyed the annual Curt Rassi family campout at the cabin a week ago.  We all had a great time and the weather was perfect.  Kate and Lincoln looked forward to it with great anticipation and it did not disappoint.  Thanks Dad and Mom!

         

Pictures can make our life look so perfect and we have a tremendous amount of things to be thankful for.  While we treasure these moments and times with young kids who still like us, our 4th entry into “the terrible twos”…..well, it never gets any easier, even after having gone through it 3 other times.  Anya is just busy, nothing is up high enough, a bowl of apples and pears left out ends up with 3 bite marks in each piece, syrup on the table ends up with the syrup all over the kitchen, breakfast dishes not put away ends up with cereal bowls dumped out on the floor or eggs spread to the far corners of the house, telling her no ends up with weeping and wailing and throwing a fit, so some days in a desperate attempt to keep from acting in a way I will later regret, I start taking pictures before dealing with the situation to give myself some time to get myself under control.  Hard to believe that such a sweet girl can also be so destructive and mischievous, and yet it’s true.  I don’t know about your house, but we need Jesus in this house.  That is the only way these kids have any hope of turning out, we surely have no idea what we are doing. 

Back to School

A few weeks ago, our sweet nephew, Elliott, was born to Nic and Amanda.  The kids were smitten with him immediately.  Thanks for the pictures, Nic!

First day of school.  Kate’s in 3rd grade and Lincoln in 1st.

This year, Kate and Lincoln wanted to walk in by themselves, so I don’t have a dramatic 1st day of school story.  We stayed in the car, Creighton cried, and asked how many more days until he gets to go to “the big school.”  Well, buddy, only 365 more days, give or take.  ; )

In August, we celebrated Kate and Creighton’s birthdays, but my pictures aren’t very good.

We got to spend a day in St. Louis with our good friends, Ross and Jamie.  We went to a Cards/Cubs game and although it was super hot in St. Louis, we had a great day together!  Thanks guys!!

Creighton started preschool three afternoons a week.  He loves it, but still asks me everyday how many more days until he turns 5 and can go to the big school.

 

Reunions and Birthdays

I can hardly believe this is our last full week of summer vacation.  The kids start back to school a week from today.  We have had a wonderful summer.  Last summer was difficult in many ways, due to the ages and diversity of the 4 kids, so I was prepared for the summer to be really hard.  However, they have done really well.  The last two weeks there has been a lot more fighting, but they’ve really gotten along well all summer and we have had a lot of fun together.  I’m so thankful for this as my expectations were very low after last year.  =)  One thing I asked the older two kids to do was to make a list of 4-5 things they would really like to do over summer vacation.  We managed to do all the easy ones, but a trip to Chicago did not happen this summer.  I don’t think they minded too much, we stayed plenty busy.  But one thing they both had on their lists was a trip to the zoo.  My Mom went with us one day and we had a great (cool) day at the zoo.

   

Another summer vacation list item: roasting marshmallows….a few neighbors joined in on this fun.

   

This past weekend we enjoyed the annual Kaiser weekend.  Thank you to all my aunts and uncles and grandparents for all the work they did to make it a success!

 

  

Creighton turned 4 yesterday and we had fun celebrating with him.  His choice for a meal was hamburgers, macaroni and cheese, cottage cheese, and chocolate M & M cookies. Happy Birthday, Creigh!

Perfect Pictures

I was looking around our house this morning and noticed many of our pictures are getting dated, especially ones of Anya, she has changed a lot in the past 6-12 months.  So I decided to take some new ones.  In my mind, I set out to get “perfect” pictures, you know, ones where everyone is looking AND smiling AND has their hands neatly folded in their lap….Well, I did not get those.  What I got were some like this:

This:

This:

This:

This:

This:

And this:

When we first came back inside I was frustrated, but the more I thought about it, the more I smiled about these pictures.  I was planning to make the kids suffer through another photo shoot, but I think I’ll frame some of these after all.  What better reminder that we aren’t a perfect family, never will be, and that is 100% ok. =)