Girls Weekend!

This past weekend was our 2nd annual Girls' Weekend! The same group of girls headed to Branson again for a 3 night stay with no kids and no husbands. It was glorious to have some refreshing girl time with no agenda. 

We got there Thursday night and made our first stop at Walmart...glorious. But we needed groceries for the weekend. (and some of us needed to walk off our car sickness...) :)

We just relaxed and made dinner together at the house that night.

We all slept in Friday morning. I think the first person was up at 9:15 and the last person got up around 10:30. Awesome! After a long breakfast and coffee, we all got ready and headed to the outlet malls. (Alaina met us at the outlet malls that afternoon because she couldn't stay the whole weekend. This picture is before she joined us).

After a few hours of shopping, we headed to Cantina Laredo for a yummy Mexican dinner. It was fabulous. We ate outside right by the river, and it was beautiful.

We headed back to our house for another relaxing night of conversation and relaxation. We all slept in again on Saturday morning, and enjoyed coffee and breakfast together. It is so nice to have a relaxing breakfast without kids whining that they are so hungry, wanting to watch a show, etc... :)

We didn't have any set plans on Saturday (which was awesome!)

Silver Dollar City (an amusement park) was within 30 minutes of the house we stayed at, so a few of the girls (who don't get sick on roller coasters...) headed there for a few hours. 

Meredith, Krista and I decided it sounded way more relaxing to lay out by the lake which was 1/2 mile from the house. This was our view for the next four hours. It was amazing, and the weather was perfect.

We all met up back at the house and grilled yummy chicken and shrimp for dinner. Did I mention the house has a hot tub? It was fabulous. We slept in again Sunday morning and headed back towards home late morning. 

This is definitely becoming a yearly tradition!!

Gramma came! (and Easter)

 Gramma came to visit last weekend. We hadn't seen her for a few months, so we were very excited to have her here!

All the kids love to cuddle with Gramma on the couch and watch cartoons in the morning. Joey and Kylah had school on Friday, so Norah was enjoying Gramma all to herself.

My mom, Norah and I all went and had lunch with Joey and Kylah. They loved having Gramma at their school and showing her around. Gramma even got to go to recess with Kylah!

Gramma made Mickey Mouse pancakes (her specialty!) on Saturday morning.

 We had a full day on Saturday, and it was beautiful outside so we spent most of the day outside. Kylah had a softball scrimmage, so that was really fun to have Gramma here to watch.

After baths that night, Gramma snuggled with all three kiddos on the couch.

 My mom brought lots of goodies for the kids' Easter baskets (thankfully, because all I had were stuffed bunnies!). We hid eggs and baskets the night before, so when the kids got up on Sunday they could have an egg hunt right away. They loved it.

Norah was very excited about her chocolate bunny.

 Joey found his basket in the dryer.

And Kylah found hers too!

 Norah (decked out in her candy bracelets and necklace...) had Gramma help her with some Easter activities from her basket.

All dressed up for Easter service. So cute!

I don't match the girls often (because Norah mainly wears Kylah's hand-me-downs) but I found matching clothes for Easter. I love when they match, and they do too!

The whole fam.

And a funny one.

Gramma with her grandkids.

And Norah wanted to do a funny one with Gramma. :)

Joey had Gramma help him with another Easter activity.

And Gramma even brought an egg-dyeing kit, so we did that after Easter dinner (Joe made a fabulous dinner of brisket, gouda mashed potatoes and asparagus!!)

I love the concentration.

They were all quiet and focused...for about 10 minutes.  :)

What a fun Easter, and extra special that we got to spend it with my mom!

a Manthe weekend

 So I'm finally blogging about our fun weekend last weekend.  I think I'm getting lazy...or just busy... ;)

We headed up to Kansas to see Joe's family. It was their pastor's 40th anniversary at Joe's church where he grew up (and Pastor Seaba married Joe and I too!) All of us met up in Kansas (minus Josh and Val and family, whom we definitely missed!!)

We had fun watching these two twin cousins together. And they had a few matching outfits from Nana which made it even more fun.

They are adorable together.

Nana also surprised the older girl cousins with matching pajamas. They were so excited. Joey and Kylah love playing with their cousin Hannah. She even got to have a sleepover with Kylah on Friday night. I think they stayed up talking for a long time...

And I finally got to meet my sweet nephew, Silas. He is the sweetest baby ever. He is so easy going and cuddly.

On Saturday morning we took the kids to an Easter egg hunt put on by Jody's work. The kids were excited/scared thinking they were going to be hunting eggs next to the "bad people." (Joe's dad is the plumber's foreman at the prison). We quickly corrected them that we weren't actually hunting eggs inside the prison and we wouldn't see any of the prisoners. They were relieved, but maybe a little disappointed not to see any prisoners. Oh the minds of kids...

The egg hunt was really fun. I love this little line up of the kids and their Easter baskets.

Egg hunting pictures of little ones is just so adorable.

Joey was having a blast (and they separated the big kids from the little ones which was great.)

Kylah was all business running around getting eggs.

Kylah has finally overcome her fear of mascots. Every one of my kids has been deathly afraid of mascots at one point in their lives. Right now, Norah is terrified. She didn't even want the bunny looking at her. She was shaking and gripping me in fear that I was going to take a step closer to the bunny. Hilarious.

With eight kids hunting eggs, we had quite the loot of eggs and candy. We had fun sorting the eggs from the candy together.

Back at the house Norah and Naomi put back on their matching "dresses" (dresses that are actually nightgowns...) and played with Nana and Grandpa's new dogs, Linus and Lucy. The dogs are adorable, and all the kids loved playing with them.

It was a beautiful day on Saturday, and I enjoyed sitting on the porch cuddling Silas. I could cuddle sleeping babies forever!

Cute little girl cousins (and Lucy!!).

Joey even sat still for a minute to hold his cousin. Joey is excited to have another boy around with all these girl cousins. He definitely misses having Deacon and Caleb around! (Luckily he plays great with Hannah and Kylah, and they spend hours running around outside and playing in the fort.)

Also, he has a fun Grandpa who lets him help with "man things". Grandpa and Joey cut down a tree together (I'm still not sure why this tree needed to be cut down...) But, it made Joey feel like a big boy, and he even got to use the sawzall (yes I had to look up how to spell that...)

Saturday afternoon, Great Grandma took the grandkids to ride the carousel in town. They loved it, even though Joey said he got a little motion sick. :)

I didn't go with, so I don't have any pictures.

But, I did get a cute picture of the kids with GG on Sunday at church. So cute!

And Norah and Naomi were dressed in matching outfits again.

And Silas wore his new outfit we got him. I love seeing little baby boys dressed like their daddies in polos!!

When we got home, we did a quick redecorating of Joey's room. We found some Kansas Jayhawk things while we were in Kansas, and Joey's been asking to have a Jayhawk room for a while. Joe was more than happy to let him. :)

Joey says he sleeps so good in his new room now that it's Jayhawks!

Mia

 This past weekend I got to go to Pittsburgh to meet my newest baby niece Mia. She is the sweetest baby. I did a lot of this.

 I even caught her winking at me!

I mean, seriously, too cute. 

I loved having Mia all to myself without having to share her (even with my own kids!) A big thanks to Joe for watching our kiddos so I could go!

I am loving having all these new nieces and nephews to love on. This weekend we are heading up to Kansas to meet our newest nephew Silas. He is so cute and I can't wait to cuddle him too! (And Norah always LOVES seeing her cousin-twin Naomi!) :)

Spring Break 2014

 We had a fun Spring Break week. This fun week would not have been possible without great friends who volunteered to take Joey and Kylah on the days I worked. We are really so blessed to be surrounded by such great friends.

On Monday, Joey and Kylah got to hang out with Callie and her kiddos. They had a great day, and made a few movies with iMovie on their iPad. The movies were really funny, and of course Joey wanted me to download iMovie at our house (but I have a Kindle not an iPad, so that didn't work...)

On Tuesday I was off work so I was with the kids. I had wanted to do something fun outside, but it was freezing, so that didn't happen. So we went bowling instead with our friends Walker, Jade and Jewel. They had a good deal to eat lunch and bowl, so that's what we did. They had a great time. We stopped at a park after bowling, but only stayed about 20 minutes because it was so cold and windy!!

 On Wednesday, my friend Amy took Joey and Kylah for the day. They explored the trails around the museum and then went inside the museum and did some fun kid activities. Then they headed back to Amy's house and played outside for hours, according to Amy. Sounds like a blast! They came home with many stories to tell of their fun day!

On Thursday, my friend Leigh took Joey and Kylah with her two girls to Tulsa to the Tulsa Aquarium. Joey and Kylah both loved it!

They had such a fun day and came home with many stories to tell.

On Friday, I had the day off and Christine and Brian came into town so we all headed to the trails to ride bikes and hike. The kids were pretty adventurous, going in caves, hiking, climbing. The weather was beautiful all morning. We brought Connor with us, and Amy and Timmy met us too!

The waterfall is always a favorite stop. We had to remind the kids that it was not hot outside, so they shouldn't get too wet!

We also hit the library later that afternoon after it started raining, and then Christine and Brian stayed for yummy steaks on the Egg made by Joe. What a fun day!

We are so blessed to be surrounded by all these wonderful friends. There are always people willing to take our kids for us and help us out. We love them and love doing life with them all!