"Life"

I feel like I often blog about the events that go on in our family's life but leave out the every day details that make my heart smile.  The events are fun, and we make special memories with them but it's the little things that happen every day that make being a mom wonderful.  Sometimes, it's the little things that happen every day that make being a mom incredibly difficult.  I guess that's life though, and I don't want to miss out on "life" in my blog.
I've been telling myself a lot to stop and take a picture of the small, funny things around my house that I want to remember.  Like when Andrew stuck his suction cup toothbrush sideways on the counter and then put a toilet paper roll on it.  Or how every time I get ready to turn the dishwasher on, Daniel has, without fail, already put the soap in.  There's also the billion times I've been out by myself and I put my hand in my pocket only to discover a pack of fruit snacks, a pacifier, and ten ritz crackers smushed to smithereens.  None of that is really worth talking about but that's just it.  All of those things have made me smile inside and think, "I sure am glad I have kids."
We've been really having a hard time with our kids getting along recently.  It's been TOUGH!  I am seriously dreading the teenage years with all my heart if this is what six-years-old looks like.  Phew.  We've made some progress though and even though they are baby steps, they are baby steps in the right direction.  Every time one of our kids doesn't freak out when the other one does something that annoys them, I just beam.  They are small victories that will add up to a lot one day.  Josh and I have SO many things that we want to change about ourselves as parents. Each time we take a baby step in the right direction, I know it's progress.  We're not even close to perfect, or even sane for that matter, but we are trying to make it.  Life is busy and hard and challenging.  At the same time, life is fun and exciting and joyful and we feel incredibly blessed to call one another family.

 These are pictures we took for our laundry room.  I hung a quote above them that says, "The most memorable days usually end in the dirtiest clothes."  I found that quote years ago and now that I have a house, I was finally able to make it a reality.  I plan to post some house pictures soon.  I realize that I never have.  We are coming up on our one year anniversary of owning this house.  It is very hard for me to believe that's it's already been a year.  Time is flying!!  The kids LOVED getting all muddy to take these.  We had to remind them several times that this was a ONE TIME THING!  Surprisingly, they haven't gotten back in the mud without me knowing.  Who knows, maybe they're listening to us after all....

(Love those rolls, btw).

Dr. Lee aka Coach Lee aka Daddy

 Josh began teaching at FSU for the first time about a month ago.  He only has to teach one semester a year, and so far, everything has gone well.  He comes home after a long day of teaching completely exhausted.  His class is an intermediate accounting class and he has about 130 students.  I love asking him a billion questions about his interactions with his students.  It is so interesting to me.  Before the first day of class, we memorized all of his students names with their faces.  We hooked it up to our tv and spent hours memorizing who was who.  On the first day of class, he went around and was able to name all of his students.  They thought that was pretty cool.  Josh said it was MUCH harder than he thought it would be.  These students are mainly juniors so they took their student picture three years ago.  A lot of them look very different now.  Some have different hair color, facial hair/no facial hair, glasses/no glasses.  It was hard but he was glad he did it.  These pictures are of him on his first day of teaching.

 My handsome Dr. Lee.  ;-)

 I love this picture because Andrew looks like half of Josh.  So cute!

 Josh is also coaching the kids soccer team.  Anna and Andrew are playing on the same team, the Blue Panthers.  Their two good friends, Cody and Austin, are also on the team with their dad as the assistant coach.  It's been fun to watch how they've improved over the last couple of months.  I'm really interested to see how they will be in a few years when they've had some maturing and practice.  The games are a lot more fun than I thought they'd be.  I feel surprisingly more competitive than I thought I would.  I really, really want them to score!  Haha!

 It seems that game days have been surprisingly cold.  We've bundled up and Daniel is constantly asking for hot cocoa.  ;-)  I love this little hat on Jenna.  Such a cutie!

 Andrew has gotten much better.  Sometimes he is off in lala land but if he pays attention, he's not half bad.  Andrew is the youngest on the team, so in two years, when he's the oldest, I think he'll be great.

 Like the pink gloves?  You know you have sisters if....

 LOOK AT THAT FACE!!!  HAHA!!!

It's been a fun, super busy few months.  We're happy though.

Anna Turns Six!

 Our sweet Anna celebrated a birthday a few weeks ago.  She turned six years old and loved every second of it.  That girl loves attention.  She gets that from her mama.  Her birthday was on a Tuesday.  We made her a yummy birthday breakfast of her choice and then sent her off to school.  The boys and I went to her school to eat lunch with her.  She got to wear a special birthday hat in her class.  We brought cupcakes up to share with her class.  They all sang her 'Happy Birthday' and she got to pass out the cupcakes.  It was so fun to see how she acts in a classroom setting.  She is very quiet and reserved and strictly obedient to her teacher.  I think she's afraid to step out of line even a little bit because she doesn't want to get in trouble.  I'm totally the same way.  I hate, HATE feeling like I am in trouble.  That night, she got to pick where we would go out to eat.  She chose Wendy's.  We had a little family birthday party for her at home where she opened her presents.  We also watched a little video we made of her birth story.  She cried during it and said she couldn't wait to have her babies.  SO sweet!
A few days later, we threw Anna a ballerina birthday party where some of her friends came.  It was so fun to prepare for this special day.  Anna helped with the decorations and my parents came down to join in on the fun.  It was a lot of work.  Parties always are.  However, when your child is as happy as Anna was that day, it's all worth it.  Below are some pictures of our party day.

 We made this glittery ballerina about a week before the party.  Anna laid down on the foam board and I traced her.  She then helped me put the glitter on.  She definitely took ownership in this project, which I think is great!

 We bought all of the girls princess crowns, tutus, and made our own ribbon dancers.  It was so fun to prepare for these little ballerinas.

 Anna also wanted to play pin the tiara on the ballerina.  She drew this ballet dancer all by herself.  I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the bun in her hair and the slippers on her feet.  So cute!!

 At one point in the party, we passed out all of the girls' tutus and ribbon dancers.  Then, I taught them a little dance.  We practiced a few times and then the girls got to perform for their moms.  It was so fun!!  They loved it.

 Even Jenna got her own tutu.  Darling!!

 Here are the girls making their tiaras.  They did such a good job.  ;-)

 Having my parents there was amazing.  It was great because of their company and also because they were SUPER helpful.  There's no way I could have made it otherwise.

 Jenna was having a great time with Grandpa and just smiling ear to ear.  The balloon was a big hit with her.  She was laughing like crazy at it.

 Singing Happy Birthday.

 I

t was SO funny because I set out some ballerina berries but the girls couldn't reach them.  Haha!  That did not even cross my mind.  

 It was a great party.  ;-)

 Here is Anna on her actual birthday being silly.  We could hardly get her to stop laughing!!

 Making silly faces.  She would hardly give us a half-way decent smile.  ;-)

 Here we are up at Anna's school.  It was seriously fun.  We loved going to see her and talking to the other kids.  She was just as happy as could be.

 Here is Anna passing out her cupcakes to her classmates.  She was SO excited!

 On Anna's actual birthday, she got to go to dance.  All of the girls sang to her and she loved it.

 I love this face.  She was beside herself excited to get an alarm clock.  Such a simple gift.  Such a happy girl!

I sure do love this girl.  She is very tender-hearted, thoughtful, obedient, and fun.  Our family would not be the same without her.  ;-)