I’m embarassed to say that Jesse and Owen’s birthday party was Saturday, JUNE 27th! I’ve been such a slacker with my pictures lately! At least they’re all on my computer waiting to be shared when I get the time. :)

Anyways, we decided to do Owen and Jesse’s party together this year because their birthdays are only ten days apart and we love having all of the family together, so we figured we’d probably have a better turn out if we had ONE big party. My parents offered to host the party at their house in Greenwood. That was GREAT because it allowed my sister-in-law to come down from Shelby, NC while my brother was out of town. I love spending time with her and it just doesn’t happen enough! We rented an inflatable water slide and Jesse picked a “sports” theme. I made a chocolate cake with chocolate icing, sugar crystal sprinkles and little candy soccer balls. My dad grilled hamburgers and hotdogs and my mom made the ABSOLUTE BEST seafood pasta salad in the WHOLE world (mom, I still need to get that recipe from you!). The weather was perfect, the kids all had a blast, and Jesse and Owen had lots of friends and family there to show them how much they are loved and cherished. One of my favorite parts of the planning process was making the “goody cups”. Jesse’s favorite color is red and I had an exact mental image of what I wanted to do. SO, I gathered up the goodies; swirly straws, a few pieces of candy, tatoos, a soccer ball whistle, a little parachute animal, and a glow stick and I strategically placed them into a red cup with a stencilled “J” on the side in white paint. They turned out exactly how I imagined. It was fun. I just don’t have the opportunity to be all that creative these days. Too busy. All in all, a great party. The only thing missing was the Baileys!! We missed you guys!

The last picture is of the chocolate, chocolate chip pancakes that we made per Jesse’s request on his actual birthday (7/2). MMMmmm!

~audrey

Good grief, what is my problem??  I haven’t been on the computer at ALL lately.  The funny thing is, that is what I wanted.  I wanted to stop spending so much wasteful time on the computer.  Luckily, that’s excactly what I’ve done.  I do, however, need to work blogging back into the equation, because I love blogging and if I go more than a day or two without posting anything, I forget all of the great and funny things that I plan to write about….for example, Owen’s little accident yesterday…

…it was Thursday afternoon and I knew my husband was going to hang out with a friend after work for a while, so I decided to skip our morning trip to the pool and go after dinner instead.  It’s less crowded in the evening and it’s great to wear the boys out right before bed.  We went from about 5:45-7:30pm.  It was great.  Since it wasn’t very crowded and the sun was going down behind the building, I got in the “big pool” with the boys for about thirty minutes.  They always enjoy it when I get in with them.  I don’t really know why, to be honest.  It’s not like we do anything special when I get in with them, but Owen loves it because I spin him around in circles and let him jump off the side into my arms.  He’s such a little fish.  He likes it when I let him go all the way under water when he jumps into my arms before bringing him back up safely.  I’m so thankful my kids love the water. 

After the first break time, the boys went over to the water park area.  This is an area where there are several water features, like buckets that dump water out from 20 feet up in the air, different types of water falls and sprinklers.  It’s a lot of fun and really great for the kids who don’t want to get all the way in the pools.  Owen and Joshua were in the water park area when I asked Jesse to go tell them it was time to get dried off.  Next thing I know, there are several kids crowded around Owen and I can see that he is crying.  The right side of his face looked really red as I walked closer to him.  Joshua said, “I think he fell and scraped his hands.”  Without even looking directly at Owen, I squatted down and looked at his palms….nothing was there.  Then I looked up at his face…. OH MY GOSH!  Apparently, when Jesse said, “it’s time to go”, Owen took off running…or at least, that was his intention.  He tripped over his own feet and took a dive into the pavement.  His right shoulder and elbow were scraped up a little bit, but the worst part was his sweet little face.  He scraped his right cheek and had a goose egg the size of a golf ball on his forehead.  I think the 18 year old lifeguard was freaked out more than any of us.  He kept saying, “Um, ma’am, I really think you should take him to get that checked out.  That looks bad!”  I just kept smiling and saying, “yeah, okay, thanks!”  All the while, I’m thinking, ‘look buddy, I have three boys and if I took them to the ER everytime they had a bump on their head, I’d be broke!”  I know the rules and things to look out for when they hurt their heads.  Half my family is in the medical field.  I made sure everything was alright, but we certainly did NOT spend our evening in the ER.  He’ll look like a bruiser for about a week, but he’ll be fine.

Here is a picture:

I feel like it’s been ages since I last wrote a post. I believe it’s actually been one month today. HOLY COW!? I can’t believe it’s been a month. Well it certainly hasn’t been that long because of a lack of things to write about! I’ve really been battling with myself this summer about the amount of time my family spends in front of “the screen”. Whether it be a computer screen, a television screen, the little screens on the boys’ DS…you get the point. As a result, we decided to cancel cable altogether and drastically limit their screen time on the computer and DS. Another result of that has been a huge reduction on how much time I spend in front of the computer. Not much facebook these days. I pretty much only get on the computer once a day to check my email or do online banking. I have to admit, it’s been pretty nice not feeling like a slave to the computer, wasting countless hours in front of facebook, reading about other people’s productivity! I know…pathetic!
Anyways, a lot has been going on since my last post. After MUCH prayerful consideration, we’ve decided to continue homeschooling Joshua and he will begin first grade in a few weeks…right here at home. On the other hand, we feel Jesse will really benefit from a year in a “real school”. Joshua had a year of “real school” in pre-k and LOVED it. Jesse’s personality is so completely different from Joshua’s and aside from feeling stuck in the middle of his two other brothers, I think it will be great for Jesse to have daily structure in his learning environment that Joshua hasn’t really needed being at home. The greatest part is, he’ll be going to the private, christian school where my husband and I both graduated and my mother-in-law has been the director of school activities for twenty years!  To be honest, I was debating putting them BOTH in school next month, but when I told Joshua about my ‘idea’, he burst into tears and said, “But Mommy, I thought you wanted to spend time with me? I love homeschooling.” I know, talk about breaking my heart! Later that day, after discussing his response with my husband, I told Joshua that I will continue to homeschool. The look on his face was as if I’d lifted a weight from his shoulders. Like someone had told him he was going to die and then came back and said, “nevermind, we were wrong, you’re fine!” My heart melted as the joy returned to his face and we’ve been planning his academic year ever since.
My whole family is oozing with excitement and anticipation at what the next month will bring. We’re going camping with my parents this weekend in South Carolina. Jesse has open house for kindergarten in three and a half weeks, he starts school in four weeks, and we should be receiving our two newest members of our family any week now. The fostering process is complete, we’re just waiting on the homestudy to come back from Atlanta where everything is being put on record for the state of Georgia. It’s all very exciting!
In the last month, Owen turned two and Jesse turned five. We had an absolutely WONDERFUL birthday party for them together at my parents’ house in Greenwood, SC. I’ll post pictures later. In fact, I have lots of pictures that I need to post in the next week or so. We spent last weekend at the lake as a family and it was a nice time of relaxation and fun.
I can’t believe we’re looking at the final four weeks of summer already. Everything within me wants to pack it full of fun, creative outings and experiences for the kids, but I know that will only make it pass by that much faster. I long for the simple life, when you don’t have to leave your house for days at a time unless you just want to. When neighbors stopped by to play cards and have a glass of tea. When deciding what was for dinner was as easy as stepping into your backyard garden and seeing which veggies were ripe for the picking. I love the old days. If only I had been born in the thirties or forties. I’ve been reading a lot about the time surrounding the Great Depression. It has been very interesting to see how everything unfolded in that day and age and then compare it to the times we’re in now…. Well, I suppose that’s an entirely different post in itself.
Good Night… until next time.
~audrey