Monster Socks

Aunt Mary was recently in town for a visit and she came with gifts.

Owie

This past Saturday we attended a birthday party at a friend's house. This friend lives in the mountains, quite a drive from us, and we don't visit all that often. Anna was very excited to run, play and check everything out. Unfortunately, they have a wood burning stove in the center of their family room and before I had any idea what she was about to do, Anna unknowingly placed her hand on the stove. sigh

Poor baby. She screamed for the solid hour it took us to drive home. I don't know the words to describe the state of my nerves by the time we arrived home.

She has a well baby appointment on Tuesday anyway and I am fairly certain that these are nothing worse than 1st degree burns so we will have her hand checked at that time. The burns are across her palm and on the tip of each of her little fingers. OW! It still hurts her a bit on and off, but not nearly as much as it did on Sat. She is a little trooper!

The parenting gig....some days....

We hope you are all well! Nathan had a super fun birthday and is now sound asleep. I will share pics later this week.

Love to all!

Happy Birthday Nathan!

April is a big month for birthdays in the S house. Today my sweet little Nathan turns 5. I get all choked up just thinking about it. Our Nathan started life as a premature, very sick little guy. He spent a few weeks on a ventilator in the NICU before coming home.

When I look at him now, it is tough to connect the memories of that fragile little baby with the live on the edge, no fear, if it can be climbed it will nay MUST be climbed little boy he has grown into.

Nathan is our joy. He is our carefree, athletic, easy going, light up the world with his sunshine smile spirit.

Happy birthday sweet boy! I promise I will try to remember that you don't want to be called baby, but I hope it's ok if I still think of you that way.

I can't believe you are five years old.

Birthday Girl Pictures

Anna had a lovely birthday and we have the pictures to prove it! We met daddy for a very late breakfast, went to the zoo, took a nap and then went out to dinner with extended family. What could be better? I have assembled a few pictures for your viewing pleasure. Anna is wearing another creation from Nana's Boutique. Mom, I have to tell you, this is BY FAR my absolute favorite dress you have ever made. I love, love, LOVE it! Anna loves it too. The twirl factor is through the roof!

The dress was washed and dried during nap time so that she could wear it do dinner even after her birthday trip to the zoo birthday ice cream.

Note the birthday giraffe, also acquired during the birthday trip to the zoo.

The boys used their Easy Bake Oven to make her the DARLING Scooby Doo cake you see in one of the pictures.

We took her to the grocery store to pick out a little cake for her dinner party tonight. Thinking we know our little princess well, we directed her to cakes decorated with lacy patterns, pink frosting etc. Our little princess dismissed all of these options in favor of, "Da monter tate!" Translation: The monster cake! I did not get a very good picture of it, but you get the idea. That's our princess!

Apologies for the stream of pictures without captions.

Love to all!

Happy Birthday Anna!

Our littlest deduction turns 2 on April 15th. I'll let you use your imagination as to how she earned that nick name.

TWO YEARS OLD!

Where does the time go?

I have assembled some of my favorite, recent Anna pictures into a slide show for your viewing pleasure.

Happy birthday baby girl! Your sunny smile and shouts of "Lo!(Hello)" and "Yook! (Look)" light up the lives of everyone you meet. We love you to pieces and wish you many, many more happy bithdays, even if it does mean you are growing up.

Great Grandma Eva

It has been a difficult week. We lost Jesse's grandmother a week ago last Tuesday. She was a dear, sweet, wonderful woman; the quintessential grandmother. She will be greatly missed.

I have been searching frantically for the pictures I took of Isaac, Nathan and Anna with grandma Eva this past Christmas and have found, to my complete dismay, that they appear to have been eaten by my rotten computer. I so wish I could post a picture with this post.

Isaac and Nathan are very sad and tell us often how much they will miss her. We are trying to gentle them through this and help them understand that death is real and permanent while balancing the fear and sadness by explaining that grandma Eva is now with Jesus and she is very happy.

This is one of those parenting moments that I just did not sign up for. I hope we do a good job.

Anna asked me today while I was rocking her down for her nap if she could see grandma Eva later in the evening.

In truth, I have almost as limited experience with loosing a loved one to death as my children do. This has been a learning experience for everyone in the S house.

We said goodbye today and will now attempt to move on. We are a little bit sadder, a little bit wiser and a lot more appreciative for each moment we have with those we love.

Love to you all.