Birthday and My First Day of School

yes! i had a birthday. and if you read my last post (i know, two within a short amount of time, i must be improving) you know that it was on the 23, my kids first day of school. but since they have no money they had to wait until daddy came down to visit to get me my gifts. well worth the wait. there are days i feel old and days i feel really old, but this day i was just worn out from cleaning all day (please don't judge how i look in these pictures... cleaning as long as i did does take it out of ya). so the beautiful and thoughtful gifts from my kids made the end of my day perfect.
which brings me to the next item of business.... my first day of school. yes people, i went back. jmu accepted me with slightly opened arms and i have joined the crowds and crowds and crowds (there are a lot of students there) of kids aiming for the higher education. because svu and jmu don't really see eye to eye, most of my credits didn't transfer... only 38 did. so i'm basically a sophomore..... again. but that is ok. i have been to all of my classes and love almost all of them. i'll keep ya posted about them, maybe. i did get a rude awakening right before my first class. i don't remember what was said that prompted a kid to ask if i was a freshman too, but my response was "honey, my freshman year was in '97". his response "how old are you?". have to admit i left myself open for that one. but it is so true, walking around campus all day yesterday i felt every year of my age. i should have gotten a picture of when i got home.... i am still so sore from all that walking, most of it uphill, i kid you not! i don't even have to worry about getting to the gym now, i can just walk all over campus.

not the best picture, but it shows that my kids got me flowers and a balloon (that says birthday princess) for my birthday. funny fyi: the flowers turned the water in my vase pink, pretty!








big thick envelope means a big card that has sound, good thing or bad? well, this card said that i wasn't old until the fat lady sings....










she sang.... and the kids all laughed at me. i'm not really that old, though some days i certainly feel it.











writing out directions for grandma. thank heavens my mother is willing to watch my kids so i can do this. mondays and wednesdays will be the longest, ALL day on campus. either that or run out of gas goin back and forth between classes (i have long breaks between all of them).






here is my snazzy new lunch 'box'. i was such a geek pickin out all my school stuff, including this. sorry, no justin beiber or unicorns for me. i'm goin for the sophisticated look (but can i really pull it off?)








here i am.... off to face the world of 18 to 21 year olds.... hoping i won't get lost or go to the wrong class












the most expensive sticker i have EVER bought!! and i thought the school was kidding when they said they have people patrolling the garage.... i saw a little gray haired man going from car to car, checking for the proper sticker in the proper place (i'm so glad i can follow directions)

and now there are two!

happy birthday to me! happy birthday to me! the first day of school just happen to be on my birthday. i was so excited. i got dressed, made the kids lunches.... that's right.... i said kidS! then ran upstairs to "scream" that it was the first day of school and that it was time to get up. erica was already up, but i had to drag aidan out of bed a bit. once he remembered that it was the day he got to ride the bus he fully woke up. breakfast, brushing of teeth, family prayer then off to the bus. sofia didn't want to leave the busstop, but when i said she could pick the movies and play with all the toys.... she ran down the street back to our house yelling "my pick, my pick". at lunch time mom picked me up and took me out for lunch, we left sofia with her great-grandparents. and during lunch (or soon after) there was an earthquake... who knew virginia could have those. we totally didn't notice. when the kids got home from school, aidan was so excited to tell me all he did. he was a bit sad that he didn't have math homework (who is this kid) but moved on quickly. a quick dinner of nuggets and fries and soon it was bed time. now.... what to do with the rest of my birthday....

Erica turned 8!

oh the joys of having children! i have a hard time believing that my first born, my baby, has turned 8 years old. and that means baptism! i had fun planning and prepping for her big day. friends and family came to help us celebrate and it was a good day. for all the planning that was done i was a bit frazzled when we got to the church, so i forgot the important "before" pictures of erica and her uncle casey in their white clothes. oh well. and since we were able to have her baptism on her birthday we had a nice party at my parents after. lots of food and great company. now that i know all there is to know about planning a baptism, the next two will be a snap!



good morning sunshine! after i took this i jumped on her bed to wake her up (cause i could) and sang every primary birthday song i could think of. don't worry, she was in a good mood











i completely spaced when we got to the church for erica's baptism, so i have no pictures of her in her dress with her uncle casey (who baptized her). but here is her dress, made by her grandma adams.















my niece just loved visiting with her cousins, not to mention my parents house with the large toy room. she was very sad to leave

















she just loves being the center of attention, but what kid doesn't. and today (the 23rd) i had the rest of her cake for breakfast, bill cosby would be so proud (hey, it's my birthday!)











grandma webb ALWAYS picks out the best clothes. erica can't wait until it gets cold enough to wear her new jacket.












always a winner!














so my child!














the damage done! though if a certain little boy came (a friend's son) then there would be no cupcakes left.












the newest member of the family, ben, with the oldest member. how great is it that mine and my siblings kids can have a relationship with thier GREAT grandparents











aidan just handed aunt rachel the book and asked her to read it.... sofia couldn't be left out













newest memeber of the parental club enjoying some tummy to tummy time with his son!

too long!

remember erica's sunflower from last year... if not then click here for a refresher. any-who, it dropped a lot of seeds that i assumed the birds ate. well, in march two potential sunflowers were coming up, then promptly died due to a late snow. now this.... it's already about 8 inches high (that ruler in the picture is only 6") i hope this one does as well as the last one!

he loves him some tractors! he would have drivin this thing around if he could.

teachin her how to do her makeup is gonna be so much fun.... this was just face paint

one tired little miss. i was going to keep her up since she missed her nap time being at great grandma's... oh well

why..... because he could.

her last project for her second grade class. she glued and colored while i used a not-as-sharp exacto knife to cut it all out (i don't like foam board now)

she has discovered the hula-hoop. too bad none of us "older" people can do a demo for her to learn from.... i'll tell ya right now, it's not a pretty picture to watch me try and hula that hoop

new dress and new boots (they may even be on the right feet)

Not Much

not a lot has happened since my last post. i started my one class at jmu in march, but it's mostly online work. i will admit, having to write papers again is not fun. but i have two people to help in the editing process and they have both said 'not bad for one who hasn't done a paper in 8 years'... i'll take it. we had warm days and expected spring to come, erica's old sunflower dropped enough seeds last summer and some were sprouting. but the harshness of march and some late snow took care of them. i registered aidan for kindergarten and he is very excited to ride the school bus. i went to my old university to visit my brother and his wife last weekend. rachel had an art show and i was looking forward to seeing it. but due to a school wide power outage, no such luck. and can i just tell you, they have a lot of great things at svu now. the indoor pool is gone, but in it's place is a great student union... anyways. here are a few pictures to tie ya down until something big and picture worthy comes along (hint: some people are graduating college next week).

my baby is talented. she went to bed with a sheet on the mattress, a pillow with a pillowcase and pants. first go the pants, then the pillowcase, then pillow then sheet. i don't know how she finds this comfortable!

he watched his older sister for years play on the computer, now it's his turn. every day "mom, can i do playhouse disney?"

this is how you keep a 3 and 4 year old occupied during general conference... you give them lots of paper, markers and children sized scissors!

spring has sprung! and we had all the dandelions to prove it, but the nice man came today to mow them all down.

he felt it was his job to move the gravel and dirt to a better spot. the down side of being at the bottom of a hill after a major rain

you can tell when she likes something.... everything else gets ignored.

totally mezzzzzzmorizzzzzed.... i love educational dvds!

Flat Stanley in Broadway Virginia

Who is Flat Stanley you ask? Well I didn't know who he was either until my nephew, Ethan, sent him to us. If you don't know the story, what a perfect opportunity to take your kids to the library and find out. But to sum-up: Flat Stanley is a boy that gets squished by a bulletin board. He's fine, but flat as a pancake. He has many adventures because he can slide under doors, fly like a kite and even fit in an envelope. Well, we hosted Flat Stanley for about three weeks. We were very busy during that time and took some pictures of our adventures together. Unfortunately, I was a bit forgetful and didn't get as many pictures as the kids wanted. So here are some pictures and Flat Stanley telling you about them.

Hello everyone, my name is Stanley... or Flat Stanley. I came all the way from Monterey California to visit my friend Ethan's family in Virginia. Did you know that it's about 2,792 miles from California to Virginia? I didn't either. I found out that Broadway Virginia is a lot smaller, and colder, than Monterey. But being a smaller town didn't stop us from having lots of fun. I came at a perfect time. The local mall was hosting something called Read Across America in honor of Dr. Seuss' birthday, so I got here just in time for that. I got to go to preschool, a chili cookoff, a birthday party, a college class and I even met someone else named Stanley, but he wasn't flat like me. Here are a few pictures of my time here in Virgina.














Ethan's Aunt Terri took us out to dinner before we went to the mall for Read Across America. She forgot to take pictures during dinner, but got one right before we left. Look how happy everyone is. We were all very excited to possibly meet the Cat in the Hat.

I got to see the Cat in the Hat! He looks a little different than he does in his books and he's a lot bigger than I though. Erica was the only one who wanted a picture with the Cat, Aidan and Sofia were too scared.

And I got to see Clifford. Aidan and Sofia were scared of him too, so I stayed with them to keep them company.

Here I am joining Aidan and his friend Harrison in preschool. They have so much fun. Right now we are doing an art project, we used plastic beads to make animal shapes, mine was a fish. I wished I could go with Erica to her school, but after seeing some of the paper come out of her backpack I didn't think I would make it there and back in one piece. Maybe another time.

Every year their church has a chili cookoff. I have never been to one and was very excited to see what it was like. There was a lot of chili and breads and even some jello. The man in charge said the jello was to help the judges, I still don't know what that meant. We didn't have any of the chili being judged because Ethan's cousin Aidan has lots of food allergies and couldn't eat what was there. So his mommy made a special pot, it was good.

Ethan's Aunt Terri has decided to go back to school, and she took me along for her first class. I think she forgot I was still in her purse, but she let me stay once she saw me. It's a small class, but she said that soon she'll get to be in bigger classes.

March Madness

ok, maybe not 'madness', but march was busy for us. we started off the month with a visit to the mall to see the cat in the hat, did you know dr. seuss would be 107 this year? then the kids had a trip to grandma webb's house while i stayed home to 'rest'. let's see... a chili cookoff, cleaning the chapel (which my kids were excellently behaved), i had my first class, registered aidan for kindergarten.... and the month isn't over just yet. i didn't get a lot of pictures, but i couldn't let this post go picture-less. so enjoy some pictures from the end of february and early march.


















not sure what she's doing... you'll need to ask her daddy about that since he took the picture.

seriously... how much do you love this picture?! they were so into 'diego' that they had no idea i took the picture. and that is paint all over their face.... again, you'll need to ask the daddy about that one.

learn letters and numbers, check! learn shapes and colors, check! learning how to use scissors withOUT hurting yourself... double check! they did very good for the first time alone with those sharp things

she so badly wanted to use the scissors too... i'm such a mean mommy.

right after i loaded them up on fatty cholesterol deliciousness called burger king. erica was a happy camper despite not liking mustard on her hamburger.

waiting for the cat to show up. i'll spare you the pictures because they will be in the next post. but my babies were so good just sitting and waiting.