Merry Christmas✞

Merry Christmas everyone! What a fun holiday season this was this year with a whole other family in our house.  The Luchaus moved in with us just after Thanksgiving and the 6 kids were a blast on Christmas morning.  I mean, there was wrapping paper for days ☺.  Hope everyones Christmas was just as wonderful!

Here is our living room on Christmas Eve, nice and neat and orderly.  The way mom likes it☺

 Out come the stockings.  There is so much tradition and family memories that come during all of our holiday seasons, but especially at Christmas.  This stocking, and all of my family's stocking, are made by my mom.  Each one takes her anywhere from 1-9 months, depending on the level of difficulty and the time she is able to devote to it.  She has made well over 30 different stockings and they are very precious to us.  Here is Matthew, happy to be pulling out even the smallest amount of chocolate from his.☺

 Caleb got yet another item to add to his Thomas the Tank Engine collection.  This time it is Sir Topham Hatt.

 This just cracks me up.  First, I just love Wyatt's Buzz Lightyear pj's.  They are so bright you can see them from down the street.  These two could not wait to get the rescue vehicles out of their box.

 One of Matt's prize presents: A Battle Island Playset.  Awesome.☺

 My biggest boy got a big boy gift this year: A new watch.  He loved it!

 Ha, here is CJ with yet another Thomas toy.  He is just so excited.

Finally he got the remote controlled helicopter he had wanted all year.  He raised his arm and yelled "YES!" ☺

Luke's 7th Birthday

As with Luke's 6th birthday, we celebrated his 7th birthday at Camelot Park riding the mini go-karts and playing miniature golf.  He invited two of his good friends, Jaden & Holden, and along with Matt and Caleb, we had a great time!  They are such big boys, but there is just something very wrong with seeing them driving their own cars...  Afterward we stopped for dinner at Chick Fil-A and then for an ice cream cake at Baskin Robbins.We had a great night, celebrating our oldest boy... he is turning in to such a compassionate, loving and mature little man.

Pumpkin Patch 2010

We love the Banducci Pumpkin Patch!  For the last four years we, along with our friends the Congdons, have taken our families out to this great pumpkin patch south of town.  The first year we went there were 4 children between our two families~ now there are 8, with one more on the way for the Congdons!  I love looking back at the pictures from 2006 and seeing how much the kiddos have grown.  Here is a photo of Luke and Matthew from our first year...

...and a photo from this year...

I mean, how sad is that?!  Anyway, this year after the picture taking Nate and Tony took the kids through the corn maze and over to see all the farm animals while Jen and I hung out with the 2 youngest Congdons...

Brenna & Olivia.  As always, we had a great time with our little pumpkin patch tradition.  Here are a few more pics from the day:

Matthew's 5th Birthday pictures

Happy Birthday Matt!

 A little less than 1 month ago, on September 29th, our Matthew Paul turned 5 years old.  We actually had several little celebrations for him.  Earlier in September my parents held a "September Birthdays" dinner for everyone in our family, then we had a little birthday party at our home for Matt and all his friends, then on his actual birthday Nate and I went to school with our big boy and passed out cupcakes to all his classmates!  He had a great time at each one of his little parties.  While it's hard for us to believe that he has hit this mini-milestone it is such a joy watching him grow up.  He's becoming a very smart, thoughtful, hilarious guy who is a treasure to his brothers and us!  We love this little boy and are so happy the Lord gave him to us to look after.  What a blessing children are!

Hello Again

  

Fall is here! Apparently (on this blog at least) Summer 2010 never existed... sorry about that. ☺  The “happenings” around this house are as follows:

* Homeschool has started back up! Yay!!  Monday marked the start of our 9th week this year, with Matthew in Kindergarten and Luke in 1st grade.  There was definitely an adjustment period while I fumbled with our schedule, but now everything is running quite smoothly.  We set up the office into the school-room and Nate let me buy these great desks for the boys.  Even Caleb has a desk, which is stocked with coloring books and crayons, so he can sit in with us while I teach. Both Luke & Matt like math the best and both kind-of sigh as we get into reading, but they really are great students.  I am again reminded how blessed we are to be able to have our boys home with us for school!'

* Extra-curriculur activities have also begun.  This year Luke chose to try out Taekwondo and Matty is in a swimming class.  It is hysterical to watch Luke do his warm-ups and drills.  The last warm-up exercises are laps around the gymnasium and Luke is determined to run faster then the other boys.  He's so competitive! His good friend Jaden is also in his class and they just have a great time together.

Matty became a pretty good swimmer this summer and is doing equally well in his class.  His coach has him learning the butterfly stroke at the moment (which seems a little odd for a 5 year old, but what do I know?). He's also diving for rings and practicing his kicks.  He loves being in the water.  

* Caleb is alive and just happy to be Caleb ☺  His day is mostly spent playing with his brothers and eating~ it's a good life.  His little personality is as dynamic as ever and he reminds me of his daddy more and more every day.  He and I get some special time together on Wednesday mornings while the big boys  are at their enrichment classes, and he is a blast to hang out with!

Matthew's First Day at Valley Oaks

Welcome to Kindergarten, Matty!

Here is the "gang". =) Jaden, Taya, Luke, Matt and Reese are all VOCS students now!  Matthew is so excited to have his friends (or cousins, as he calls them) in his enrichment classes.

 I love this picture of my boys.  I love that Matthew has his hand on his big brothers backpack, easing his nervousness.  He is always more confident when Luke is with him, knowing his big brother will watch over him.  These brothers love each other.

 Walking to his first tractor ride!  He is actually very excited, despite the look of intrigue on his face.  The tractor takes them to their enrichment classes, and then brings them back to the school when the day is done.  When I picked the boys up Matthew had such a huge grin on his face.  He loved his first day!

Caleb and the Candy Cane

I found this video from 2008 last night and I was just dying laughing.  I think Caleb must have been about 20 months, and the whole video is very indicative of how his little personality would develop.  Enjoy!

Caleb's 3rd Birthday & Easter

How fun has my life been lately!!! I mean, it's always busy and there's never a moment of reprieve from the go-go-go, but sometimes I view it more as just "life" then as "what I fun and exciting life the Lord has blessed me with"!  And I am so blessed.  Here's a little recap of the last month:

March 15th-19th: 

Nate had meetings in Arizona and I got to go with him!  Oh what a wonderful, QUIET time I had.  I don't think Nate had that great of a time, seeing how he had required meetings from 7am until sometimes 9pm, but we did get a couple nights to go to dinner and hang out. We stayed at the Arizona Biltmore and I spent my days lounging by the gardens and researching whole/raw foods (a new passion~ check out http://www.anneandjen.blogspot.com/), sipping water and relishing in the fact that I had no bottoms to wipe or clothes to launder.  Some wonderful friends watched the boys for us and my mom and dad stayed at the house with them every night.  They did great away from us (the first time we've left them for 4 nights in a row).  The last time Nate and I got away by ourselves was in July 2005 (I was pregnant with Matthew!).  It truly was a wonderful time.

April 4th~ Caleb's 3rd Birthday & Easter:

Happy 3rd Birthday to our Caleb Joseph! 

Why is my youngest child 3 already?!  It just doesn't seem possible.  He is such a big boy, always cracking us and his brothers up and more times then not causing 70% of the havic in our home.  ;)  He has triple the amount of personality as the rest of us (well, he and Nate are about even).  He is his father, complete with the looks, charm and ornery-ness that his daddy possesses.  Seriously, sometimes he is "so Nate" it blows me away!  He has been such a wonderful blessing in our lives. 

Here is Caleb & Daddy opening gifts.  He got some Thomas trains and books, a very cool 3-wheel scooter, some clothes, books, a foam bowling lane, pins & ball... lots of great stuff!! 

Ha! I love this picture of Caleb and his adorable cousin Paige helping themselves to leftover cake.  =)

Now on to Easter... time to hunt eggs!  I think we ended up hiding 16 dozen plus 4 eggs!! What in the world.  Caleb and Paige got to go out first since they were the youngest.  Paige was cracking me up~ she would only pick up the purple and pink eggs and put them in her basket. =) She would spot and yellow egg, point to it with a huge smile, and move right on past it.  She is the cutest girl!

And then it was the big kids turn.  Luke, Matt, Claire, Kole, Keller, and Jared ran out the door and stuffed their baskets with eggs, regardless of color. ;)  Grandma and Papa's house proves to be the best place to hide/hunt easter eggs~ mom's wrap-around flower beds boast great hiding places.

Not the greatest family photo, but a family photo nonetheless.  Hope everyone had a great Easter! 

He is Risen, He is Risen Indeed!!!

What in the world was Caleb thinking?

I mean, we only left him alone for 5 minutes. He was supposed to be eating dinner, but found the temptation to eat the Nesquick too much to take. Caleb has definitely been a big fan of chocolate milk for the majority of his life, but eating it straight out of the can~ come on! It was everywhere~ in his eyes, on the floor, down his pants, under his fingernails, and, as is clearly shown in the pictures, on his face. It is going to be a miracle if this one is not shipped off to military school. =)

Here he is showing us that the chocolate is "stuck" to his hand.

I mean, it's everywhere.

And of course, the proud look.

We have a ball player

Today Matthew started his Tot Tee-Ball league. He is an official "Cub", along with about 6 other 4 year old boys. I can't even tell you how much fun it was to go out there and watch my little man have the time of his life! =) He practiced his throwing, catching, and base-running for 45 minutes under the only patch of sunshine we got all day- it was as if the Lord opened up the skies just for Matthew. Nate has been practicing with him all week and he has really gotten good at catching with his glove and stepping forward with his left leg as he throws. And apparently he bats left-handed (even though he is right-handed & throws with his right) which Nate has assured me will earn him a baseball scholarship to an Ivy League school. =) Well, scholarship or not, he is definitely going to be a ball player! Here are some fun pictures from his practice.

Getting warmed up with some jumping jacks...

...and some leg stretches.

Look at his form! =)

"Thanks dad, I really love to play baseball." -Matt