just a reminder

keeping olivia busy is so EASY.
give her some paper and a pen/pencil/marker and she's busy for hours.
used to be, she'd draw and draw for hours-
now it's all about writing.

her favorite toys have been replaced with journals.
she loves to write lists -
like who she's inviting to her birthday party (in 6 months - ha ha)
or lists of "fashionable names" as she calls them.

sometimes she journals about what's happening between
her and her friends and school.

and sometimes she just writes stuff that cracks me up -
the other day she disappeared in the basement for a while,
except for coming up once to ask tim if we had a copier {umm, no}.
later she gave us this stack of "homemade" envelopes.



she actually had them separated into the 2 sides of her family,
the vogels & the lees.
inside each envelope was the following note:



so just in case you forgot, go visit her website :)

wordless wednesday

it's that time of year...

...when there are a zillion and one things to do at school.
it's a little crazy keeping it all straight, but the kids love it!

last week was "field trip week" at our house...





hooray for 2 days of good weather in a row!
we totally lucked out!!

what a fun time of year...
even if i'm a tad exhausted :)

foiled by a 2 yr old - not once, but twice

ryan's new found outside passion is the pink barbie jeep.
the hose is a close second.

the only problem with the jeep is that ryan is TERRIBLE at driving it.
but he's only 2, so i can't blame him :)
unfortunately he likes to drive it until it hits something.
and that something is usually another person, our cars or josie in her stroller.

since i don't enjoy constantly keeping the others "safe" while he drives,
i decided the easiest thing would be to unplug the battery and tell him it was dead.

that worked for a day until he figured out how to plug it back in.

plan b - remove battery
that worked for a day until he figured out how to put it back in.

plan c - remove battery and hide it in the house

and now the other kids can play safely outside without fear of being run over...
and someday we'll teach ryan how to drive :)

soon, very soon.

i've decided ryan needs to be potty trained soon.

not because he's going to preschool in the fall.
and not because he's almost 3.

it's because it's only noon
and between ryan & josie i've changed 3 poopy diapers thus far.
yesterday it was 7.

seriously, ryan you're going to learn soon!

...

maybe i'll start blaming my lack of blogging
on all the time it takes to change diapers around here.
yup, that's the problem.
that and bejewled {thanks sarah} - ha ha
or maybe it's that i have to learn all 206 bones in the human body by next thursday...

wordless wednesday

umm, maybe not

garrett: hey mom, josie just said my name in spanish!!!!

happy mother's day!!!

my sister was in town this weekend (more on that in a different post),
my mom, sister and i all celebrated mother's day together.

group shots of "the girls" was relatively easy -
although we still need to work on looking at the camera :)



a group shot with all my kids...
well see for yourself.
this was the best one!

all in all it was a great mother's day.
the kids were so sweet -
i'll have to post a picture of olivia's card to me...
it was hilarious -
with a slight pop culture reference.

and to end a great mother's day...
my parents took the kids on an hour long walk,
then took them back to their house for baths & snacks.
they were delivered to our house all set for bed.
bliss.

happy mother's day!!

lots & lots of fun (and pictures!)

today the weather was awesome!
we packed up the kids and headed over to holland.

we only had 2 things to accomplish-
play on the beach
enjoy the tulips

mission accomplished!

{you'll notice a good group shot was not on our agenda}

the perfect solution

my kids love art projects.
unfortunately, i'm not a "fun" mom when it comes to art.
sometimes i try to get creative, but messes really, really bug me.
and it often seems like when i do let the kids do an art project,
it holds their interest for all of 5 minutes,
then i'm left with the mess.

so...

i've found the perfect solution.
art classes for kids.
every week they have different stations they can play at.
this week the boys' favorite station was pudding painting.
now that's something they won't see at home!

and the 2 best parts of art class -
the mess stays there (even the dirty art shirts!)
and
we can leave the artwork there to "dry" -
and yes "dry" is a code word for not ever having to bring it home.

no i'm not mean -
i love saving some of their art work.
but the class is 6 weeks long...
that's a lot of sponge paint pictures to file away at home!