Max

Flashlight Hide N Go Seek

A few years ago we started playing Flashlight Hide N Go Seek...

At Night

In the dark

In the house

It's something we don't do very often, Usually when we have a sleepover guest or family in town.

Well, last week our cousin Gabe came to visit us for a week of Camp Walling....His first request through the door was for hide n go seek.
So we waited until the sun went down and said, "OK let's get all the lights off.....Then all the kids disappeared.

David and I sat there wondering what happened...
A few minutes later they all appeared wearing all Black and dark clothes...so that they wouldn't be seen as easy.
Of course I needed to snap a picture, so they gave me their best Ninja Pose!

New Dress Pattern

Last week i went to a sewing retreat. After the first day I ran out of projects to do....don't get me wrong I have P L E N T Y of unfinished projects at home but I was 2.5 hours from home and still had a 12 hour sewing day ahead of me. So I promptly, went to the nearest Hobby Lobby and purchased fabric to make this cute little dress for Mia.

I love the way it turned out but I guess what I love the most is that I FINISHED the project.

Of course, I didn't have much choice with Mia pulling on my sleeve saying, "When's is going to be done? I'm ready to wear IT"

tick tock

Before Kaylee headed off to camp she asked to get a new battery in her watch. Normally she doesnt wear a watch but next week she needed to. She said when she wakes up she wants to know if its time to get up or should she force herself back to sleep. I thought that was a well thought out stance so I agreed to take her. Even though it was a saturday. As a general rule we avoid all weekend shopping. Thus avoiding the throngs of people.
So as I went around the house telling everyone where we were going,, everyone suddenly had a watch that needed repair. We ended up taking 6 watches with us. The man was kind of shocked...probably tripled his business for the day with just us.

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Underwater Camera fun

Just a few fun shots we took back at home with the underwater camera....I think it's fun

Look at the bubbles in Trent's nos

a few more.

A few more vacation shots...

What is really funny is that we bought an underwater camera so that we could take it tubing with us and not worry about getting the good camera wet. David and I both lauged when we had to explain to the kids what a film camera was. They kept saying, "can I see it?" " where's the delete button" "How do you get the pictures out?"
I realized Zane was about 2 when we got our first digital camera. We were some of the first people I know to have one simply because he worked for Casio at the time and we got our digital camera(s) free.
What I do without a digital camera?

Relaxing on the Guadalupe

For Vacation this summer we took a trip to New Branufels. We rented a cool treehouse and got to play and tube on the river.

Zane enjoyed some serious hammock time.

Ty on the other hand did not enjoy his encounter with the hammock. We aren't sure if he jumped completely over it or got on then flipped off.

We all enjoyed the water though. Yes the water was pretty shallow but the kids didn't care. They fished...

caught frogs

paddled around in the Kayak

Then we took a tube trip for several hours

It was a nice day....Even with the drought we had a Great time

The Disco Den

The girls have decorated and transformed the bunk beds into a "Disco Den"

They even went to their closests and dressed in "rodeo" clothes and declared one night as Western night at the Disco Den. Ha! Love it!

Summer's Here

Summer's here and that means a lot of different things..............

Like a high stakes show down between Dad and Kaylee in a mean game of Spoons

Sewing and crafting....Trent's first time to sew.

Lots of Naps! (especially for Max)

Sculpting a portrait of Mom....apparently I often wear high heels and have an iguana on my shoulder

and lots of fort making and special sleeping spots

I love that summer gives us all a chance to use our creative side!

Sleepover(kinda) Seventh Birthday

Mia asked for a sleepover birthday party but because of lots of activities birthday week, we settled on a Pajama party that lasted up until bed time and then the guests returned home. All the girls had a great time getting manicures and pedicures, Kaylee made them all balloon animals of their choosing and our friend Lauren did their makeup. It was such a girly night and I had as much fun as Mia did!

Happy 7th Birthday Mia! We love you bunches

What's Up with the Adoption?

When we started the aodption process again this time I thought by now we'd have a referral and might be possibly hoping to travel in the next few months. However, things don't always go as we plan or as we hope either.

Paperwork is taking a lot longer than we anticipated. The actual Homestudy process took almost 6 months just to complete. This document is the crucial piece to the big puzzle. There are many things that simply CAN'T be done until the homestudy is complete. We received our final, approved copy on May 20. I got it turned around to Immigration and now we are awaiting THE LAST PIECE of PAPER that we will need to get our paperwork packet to CHINA.
It's a long road with many stamps, seals, approvals and fed-ex packages.
But we're in the homestretch and anticipate that LAST PIECE of PAPER within the next 10 days.
THEN

Once the paperwork packet (dossier) gets to CHINA we will wait for a referral match. Once we are matched we will likely travel SIX (Long,excruiating) months later. So if you want a best case/worst case scenario. Best case is that we might be traveling in March....worst case...any month after March. (Let's pray for sooner rather than later) It would just depend on when we could get matched with a baby girl.

Still, we are excited, anxiously waiting, and trying to get our paperwork turned around as quick as humanly(and fed-exly) possible.

We appreciate your prayers, especially for our newest addition. Because it's highly likely she is already born and living somewhere in CHINA.

Cake Bakers

For at least a year the older kids have been wanting to try to make Fondant! So our second day of summer vacation we got caught up on our missed episodes of Cake Boss! and here came the "wanting to make fondant discussion" again.

Frankly, I've been a little scared of even trying it....I've heard it's really hard to make. But Kaylee got on the internet and checked out several recipes. We finally decided on one and went for it. (by went for it ...I mean the next day and after going to 4 grocery stores for the ingredients) Did you know that most major chains don't sell edible glycerin?
Yeah neither did I, but they don't. I finally substituted something else in the recipe for glycerin, crossed my fingers and hoped it worked.

and much to my (shock, awe, amazement) IT WORKED!

Mia took more of a supervisory role.

Everyone enjoyed sculpting, modeling and forming the fondant. It kind of reminds me of edible play-doh.

I think even Buddy Valestro would be proud of Trent.....he was attempting a bow

And voila....Our final creation. A pink and white polka dot cake

Time to EAT up!

Even clowns show up when it's time to devour cake.

What a fun way to spend the afternoon, and since it took so long we ran into dinner time. We had a kind of big lunch so we had cake and milk for dinner ( I know mom of the year here) But we rarely do that kind of thing and after the powdered sugar fight it seemed like a FUN thing to do...

the powdered sugar fight on the other hand....I maybe should have thought that one through....my floor is still sticky ( and I've mopped it twice)

But as Buddy would say....." At the end of the day, seeing their faces is why we do this"
AND
"That's How we do it...Hoboken Style...BABY!"