Minnesota Chaos

2011-12-19T20:54:00.000-08:00

Bethany made a thank you Smilebox to send to the friends who came to her birthday party on the 11th and I'm posting it here. We did something a little different this year. In the past, and for Anna and Katherine's party this year, we have asked for food shelf donations in lieu of gifts. The girls always want to invite lots of little friends to their parties and I'm all for that. I'm just not interested in THAT many new toys entering our house. We have enough stuff already. So, I told the girls that they can have a small party and invite just a few friends who can bring them gifts, or they can have a huge party and their friends will bring something for someone else, i.e. a food shelf donation. A friend from church put me onto the website CheerfulGivers.org. You can read the founder's story here: http://www.cheerfulgivers.org/about/founders-story/. (For some reason my links aren't going live so maybe you can copy this into your browser if you are interested...)They encourage school groups, businesses and families to host Birthday Bag parties where everyone attending the party brings items to put into birthday bags to be delivered to the local food shelf. Then, instead of parents searching frantically for a certain box of food to give their child on their birthday, they can choose one of the birthday bags. I was hooked on the idea instantly and Bethany got really excited about it, too. We had 19 kids at the party (including my four) and together they brought enough stuff to fill 24 bags! The White Bear Food Shelf was thrilled and so were the kids. It was a really fun and rewarding experience for everyone. Plus, we had coconut bowling and hula dancing - who can ask for more?

This picture slideshow customized with Smilebox

2011-12-18T12:52:00.000-08:00

Hey friends!Here I am again (almost two months since the last post...oh well). I'm trying something new today. I enjoy making Smileboxes because it's a fast and fun way to get pictures out to friends when I don't have time to arrange them on my blog. So, I thought I would try posting a Smilebox on my blog to see if it works and if everyone can access it. I think it's working but would love some feedback if anyone gets a chance.Now to explain this Smilebox... At Thanksgiving, we had the pleasure of having Mary and Zion Willitts, four-year-old twins of Joel and Karla Willitts - dear friends from our time in England who now live in Chicago - at our house. Karla is a flight attendant and had to fly on Thanksgiving Day. The hope was that Joel could accompany her on her two-day trip and they could get a mini-vacation together. (In the end, Joel, flying stand-by, missed getting on the flight by ONE seat. They didn't get the time off together but had some nice, restful time on their own which was very timely.) Anyway, some friends of theirs in Chicago were driving to MN for the holiday anyway and were willing to bring M and Z to our house! So, six kids under the age of eight ran crazy in our house for about 48 hours and had a blast! We were so sad to see them head back to Chi-Town that Saturday morning and can't wait to do it again...

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I'm baaa-aack...(or am I really?)

2011-10-29T20:51:00.000-07:00

Well, it's been forever since I updated this silly blog of mine and I finally succumbed to the internal pressure I was putting on myself and decided to AT LEAST update the pictures on the main page! Truly, I would love to start blogging again but am just not sure if I'll have the time or energy to do it. Just bein' honest here. But I'll give it the ole' college try and see what happens. In the meantime, enjoy what you can from the few new pictures I added!

What motivated me, really, was the super fun day the kids and I spent with Joel's parents, aka Bill and Lynna, aka Grandma and Granddad. Joel left for Ukraine on Thursday for a missions trip with some folks from church and Bill and Lynna accepted my invitation to come rescue my lonely self for a few days. They came mainly to celebrate Anna and Katherine's 6th - yes, I said 6th - birthday which is on Monday. Shortly after they arrived today, they were treated to a fun little play involving, if I remember right, a narrator (B), a dancer named Emily (A), a mouse named Squeaky (K) and a skirt-wearing cat named Furry (M). It was quite the hit and Hollywood has been calling all evening, as if we need more chaos in our lives....

After the applause died down, we saddled up and went out to Country Sun Farm, one of our favorite fall things to do here in MN. They have lots of animals to feed, a corn maze to tromp through, a hay ride and, of course, pumpkins. Micah and Bethany were pumped to do the corn maze while Anna and Katherine (much to Grandma and Granddad's shivering delight) opted to ride 50 cent rides in the heated pumpkin greenhouse. Once reunited, everyone chose a pumpkin to paint (another tradition we have around here...I'll have to post a picture of B's Gonzo pumpkin from last year...) and one large one to carve.

After that, we joined the throngs of people who think it's a good idea to eat at Red Robin on a Saturday night. In spite of quite a long wait, we had a lovely, relaxed meal together, complete with free sundaes for the birthday girls (it was Grandma's birthday today).

It was just one of those days that one could call delightful. Yay.

O Tammy Baum

2009-12-05T20:44:00.000-08:00

Today we embarked on a new family tradition. Armed with heavy coats, mittens and hats, we drove out to Leverty's Traditional Trees just over the bridge in Houlton, Wisconsin. It was a crisp 25 degrees out but with sunshine and no wind, it was a doable December day in the Midwest. As kids were climbing out of the car, I was deleting a few pictures off my camera so that I'd have plenty of space for all the awesome first-ever-Lawrence-cut-your-own-Christmas-tree-experience-maybe-I'll-even-get-a-good-family-shot-for-the-Christmas-card pictures I was planning to take. Then it happened. Flash-flash-flash-nothing. The little battery image on my camera's screen went bye-bye. I couldn't believe it. Didn't it say it had at least half a battery power left? Apparently not. Thankfully, after keeping it off for about 5 minutes, I was able to squeak out a few pictures of the day.

We wandered around, hack saw in hand, trying to decide whether we'd get a Fraser Fir or a Balsam Fir (clearly we would not be choosing the exceedingly poofy, Weeble Wobble-shaped Scotch Pine) and finally the enticing aroma of the balsam fir made our decision. "Please cut only trees with tags" the sign said. Easy enough. We walked down a row of balsams scoping out the shape, fullness and height of each one. Meanwhile, the three conversant children in the family were starting to say such Christmas Vacationesque comments as "Can we just pick a tree and go? I'm freezing!" Finally, we walked back to the tree that seemed to fit all our strident criteria, looked it over once more and then Joel prepared to cut it down. It struck me as feeling a bit destructive, just cutting down a tree like that. But I got over it. So, timber, the tree falls and we hoist it onto the tarp we'd been given to drag it on back to the barn. I say, "How much is it?" Joel says, "I don't know. Where's the tag?" Awkward silence as we search for the tag. Oops. No tag. We just chopped down a tagless tree. Were there penalties for this? And Joel works with one of the daughters of the owners; how embarrassing! "What's going to happen?" Bethany asked wide-eyed as Joel and I discussed our oversight. "Oh probably nothing," we assured her, but I did feel awfully bad chopping down the wrong tree. We turned to the left and spied the original tagged tree that had first captured our attention. Oops. Wrong row. Well, we thought, as we dragged our illegal tree back to the barn, why wasn't THIS tree tagged? It's a perfectly good tree. Most of the tagless ones are shrimps they're letting grow a bit more. But this one was a nice, big tree. What gives? So, the moment of reckoning arrives. "Did you find a nice one?" a friendly tree farm worker asked. "Um. Well, yeah. But we cut down one without a tag. Sorry about that." "Oh, don't worry. No problem!" Whew. No harm, no foul. We never found out why this particular tree was on the tagless list. I'm wondering if I'll wake up in the morning and find some critter's nest in it or something. At least the cats will have fun.

After a little apple cider and some shaking, netting and strapping (of the tree), we headed back home, a successful first outing to the tree farm. On the way home, Micah said, "Jee-boo, jee-boo, HEY!" which of course means, "Jingle bells, jingle bells, HEY!" In keeping with his desire to sing Christmas tunes, I said, "Micah, can you say 'O Tannenbaum'?" (Miss Leanne, who keeps the littles when the bigger kids go to co-op on Thursdays, teaches them German and this week it was the song O Tannenbaum.) He smiles and starts saying, "O Tammy Baum, O Tammy Baum." Not sure who she is; perhaps some obscure German Christmas heroine who traversed the Black Forest saving trees from the axe. In any case, it was pretty cute and made for a lovely ending to our tree-cutting adventure.

Hoo-hahns, roller skating and tooth loosing

2009-11-24T19:06:00.000-08:00

Just 2 days before her sixth birthday, Bethany lost her THIRD tooth! This time, it's front and center! Her top left tooth started wiggling a few weeks ago and tonight, it was hanging by a thread. She was pushing it out sideways with her tongue (totally grossing me out) and we kept saying, "Do you want us to pull it?" She kept saying, "No, it will hurt too much!" Then after about 10 minutes of wiggling it, she pulled it our herself! So, here are the pics!

And just last Saturday, Bethany went roller skating for the first time. After only one unfortunate bonking of the head, she did a great job! We had such a fun time together roller skating and winning tickets (read: blowing money) in the Fun Zone. We were there to celebrate her friend Abbie's 7th birthday. (They even played a little Michael Jackson, which really took me back to my Skate Magic days...)

Finally, sweet little Micah loves to put shoes on - especially my fuzzy black house shoes. One night, he kept putting them on and saying, "Hoo hahn. Hoo hahn, Mommy." I couldn't figure how he'd gotten 'hoo hahn' from 'house shoe'. Finally, it hit me: every time we get ready to go somewhere, we say, "Micah, let's get your _shoes on_." So, now, shoes are called 'hoo hahns' around here. Yeah, he's pretty stinking cute. But, here's a stumper: he calls tractors 'high yos'. Where is he getting that? Point to a tractor and say, "Micah, what's that?" and he says, "High yo." My only guess is that he has a little tractor that sings Old MacDonald Had a Farm. Maybe he's heard E-I-E-I-O so much in conjunction with that tractor that the I-O part has stuck! Who knows the mind of a toddler....

New Haircuts!

2009-11-02T20:28:00.000-08:00

Today the girls got their annual haircut. Yes, I did say annual. I'm so bad. I just cut Bethany's bangs when she can't see anymore and let Anna and Katherine's hair do what it wants. So, I decided it was time to give them official haircuts. Even Micah got his ears lowered. The girls also got a braid, pink streaks and sparkles in their hair. (Micah passed on that offer.) So, here are the pics!

Medieval Feast

2009-10-16T20:51:00.000-07:00

Tonight our homeschool co-op had our end of unit celebration. Because we had been studying the medieval time period, we had (what else?) a medieval feast! Micah was a knight, Katherine a princess, Anna a fairy/nymph, Bethany a peasant girl, Joel a monk and I was a peasant. We ate with our fingers, drank wassail, all the while being entertained by jesters and little girls dancing with ribbons and bells! It was crazy but fun. The point of the evening was for family and friends to come celebrate with us and see all the cool things the kids have done in our first 10 weeks of school. So we had all their projects on display: castles, salt dough maps, family crests, viking longhouses, mosaics and stained glass windows (made with tracing paper!). Bethany has had such a great time so far and we look forward to another 10 weeks of exploring the world and history. This unit will cover the Renaissance and at the end the kids will perform a Shakespearean play! Should be fun! So, here are few pictures...I hope to eventually get a slideshow together of some more....

Anna's broken wrist

2009-09-05T20:41:00.001-07:00

At the end of July, we were at some friends' house for the evening, and sweet Anna plummeted from the monkey bars on their swing set and broke her wrist. That's the journalistic version (you know, lead with one sentence that says the kernel of the story.). Here's what really happened: we were about to go up on our friends' deck to eat some dessert, so Joel turned to Anna and Katherine and said, "Don't climb on the monkey bars while the adults are not down here to help you." Moments later, while savoring juicy morsels of strawberry pie with whipped cream, we see Anna land on the ground underneath the monkey bars and start crying. I give the Joel "the look" which means, 'I'm not dealing with her overreactive self; it's your turn' and he tromps down the stairs to give her a pretty severe reprimand for directly disobeying orders. After delivering said reprimand-and, I must add, hearing no indication from Anna that she's hurt- he leaves her to sulk and whimper through her humiliation alone and comes back up to finish his dessert. We assume that in just a few moments Anna will have bounced back from her traumatic experience and begin clambering around on the play equipment again. Not so. Soon we begin to hear wails coming from below us. At this point we start to think that perhaps something more is going on. I run down and pick her up and she starts crying about her arm hurting. We set her down in a chair, add a little ice pack and try to ascertain exactly how badly hurt she really is. Is she just being dramatic or is this real? After a good solid 5 minutes of the same high-pitched wail and few pokes on the arm that elicit an even higher pitched one, we decide that this probably calls for a trip to the ER, because, of course, this has happened on a Saturday night JUST after the after-hours clinics have all closed. So, we drop Joel and the others off at home (a 7 minute trip during which Anna falls asleep!) and I head off for the ER. I should point out that this is poor Anna's 3rd trip to the ER. The first was when she was about 6 months old and got croup so badly they felt they should see her. The second was when she fell out of my arms on Christmas day and cut her mouth on a stool leg (worst day of my life so far). And now this. You know it's not a good thing when you say, "This looks a lot like the room we were in last time," and your child says, "No, Mommy, this is a different woom. The other woom had a ladybug on the door." Next thing you know, she'll be calling the doctors by their first names and asking about their families. Anyway, so they feel it first and say, yep, it's broken; let's see how bad. Then they do an x-ray (for which, I must say, Anna is remarkably cooperative and still). It appears that both bones just above her left wrist are broken, the bigger one a little worse than the little one. They put her in a brace and a sling and tell us to come back later that next week for casting. (They like to let the swelling go down before they cast it.) So, the following Thursday she receives a bright pink (surprise, surprise) cast above the elbow. Of course, she's left-handed so everything is hard for her but she manages with great skill and aplomb. Throughout the whole process she has been brave, stoic and just very calm. The x-ray technicians are amazed at how still she sits for her x-rays and the nurse who used a small circular saw to cut off her long cast was agog at how calm she was. "I've NEVER had a kid this age sit that still while I was doing that!" So, Anna, for all the daily drama we tend to get from her is the brave warrior in times of emergency. We've been very proud of her and she is ecstatic that in just 5 days she gets her second, shorter cast removed. I'll be ecstatic, too. Bathing a kid with a cast isn't a barrel of monkeys (well, actually...) and it'll be nice that she can run in the sprinkler without worry, if we get any more days like that. I've heard people say I should keep her cast for posterity. I don't know. Won't it just be one more thing to pile up in the closet? The jury's still out on that decision. Maybe I should. It may well be the only cast she ever has...we could only be so lucky.

Edible oasis

2009-08-29T20:12:00.000-07:00

So, we're talking about the desert this week in school and decided we should make an edible one! Brown sugar sand, Tootsie Roll/candy fruit slice palm trees, M&M water and animal cracker elephants and rhinos. The hardest part was getting the girls to actually DESIGN their oasis and not just eat it!

Oh, it's ancient history

2009-08-21T21:20:00.000-07:00

This school year, we were invited to be a part of a homeschool co-op with some families from our church and our area. We use a history-based curriculum (which is great because I LOVE history!) and because of what the other families have done in the past year, we are starting in the medieval period. Since I didn't really want to just skip ancient history (I was obsessed with Egypt when I was a kid!), and after deciding to join the group in late July, I threw together a crash course in ancient history for the girls. We talked about archaeology, how people learned to make pottery, building the Egyptian pyramids and eventually made our way to Greece and Rome. I started off strong with some fun hands-on projects so thought I'd throw together a little slide show. (Sadly, Greece and Rome really only got coloring-sheet treatment!) A few friends asked me recently to share some of the projects I do, so I'll list materials too for those who want to know.

Since the captions are so short, here's the rundown of what you'll see:
-The archaeology project: digging random things out of a bucket of paver base (sand and rocks). Materials needed: gardening gloves, small paint brushes to "treat ancient artifacts with care" (:D), a bucket, sand, and random treasures from around the house.
-Making clay pottery. Materials needed: quick dry clay, stamps, jewels to decorate, tools to carve designs with, paint to use on the pottery after it has dried (optional), water. Note: we found real clay pretty tricky to work with. I think there may be easier to use options but haven't tried anything else yet.
-Moving blocks to build the Great Pyramid: since the Egyptian farmers who built the pyramids used a type of sled (i.e. NO WHEELS!) to move all the blocks to the pyramid site, we tried pulling a landscape stone across the yard with a winter sled. The girls found out quickly how difficult that would have been!
-Sugar-cube pyramids: They loved doing this especially since we had some friends over that day who did it with us. Just Google "sugar cube pyramid" and you'll find loads of recipes for the mortar, etc. Our pyramids only had a base of 6-7 cubes. Ten is what is usually recommended but I frankly don't want enormous sugar-cube pyramids lying around my house, nor did I want to spend my entire grocery budget on sugar cubes!

So, there you have it!

A month in the life...

2009-08-15T19:23:00.000-07:00

Well, it's been a frightfully long time since I've updated my blog. Many apologies for that...July was a busy month with lots of people in town to visit us. First, Grandma and Granddad came up on the 4th and stayed with us for a week. We had a great time with them; the girls especially enjoyed going out on their own with Grandma and Granddad for a meal. Then our friends Josh and Hammer came to visit us. Formerly known as our 'basement dwellers', Josh and Amber lived with us for a few months one summer a few years ago. We always love having them here and hearing about what the Lord is doing in and through their lives. Following Josh and Hammer, our dear friends Ryan and Scottie stayed with us while they were here at Bethel doing two weeks of intensives. The kids LOVE hanging out with them and we enjoy some fun date nights out thanks to the guys. (And, they don't just babysit; they make homemade pizzas, ice cream sundaes-who could ask for more?) And then the big news, we were having dinner at a friend's house one evening and Anna fell from their monkey bars and broke her wrist. One trip to the ER, two x-rays and 5 days later, she was fitted with a super-cool hot pink cast! She has done really well with the frustration of having one arm in a cast during swim season. This Thursday we go back to the doctor; if after another x-ray, the arm seems to be healing well, he'll put it in a short cast, one that doesn't go above her elbow. Then she'll have it on for about 3 more weeks. And while all this was going on, our little garden has grown from strength to strength. So, I've included a picture of our harvest: so far just cherry tomatoes, yellow pear tomatoes and one small carrot (we'll leave the rest of the carrots to get a bit bigger! We were just curious!). The girls are having a great time watching our plants grow so big. And finally, Joel had some fun Daddy time with the kiddos for 4 days while I went to Indiana to spend time with my girlfriends from my Cambridge prayer group (see picture at the top!). It was such an encouraging time for all of us to come together and share what's going on in our lives and to pray for and encourage one another. I'm so thankful to Joel and to everyone who helped him with the kids (Amy, Kate, Melissa, Kelsey and Amanda) for making this time possible. And I'm forever grateful for the friendship of these gals, Renee, Jill, Katie and Karla. Sadly, four others couldn't be with us this year--Caroline, Pip, Alysia and Emma--and we missed them. It would take a miracle for ALL of us to get together (I guess that's what heaven is for!) but we enjoy the times we do have. So, I conclude because it's late and I should get to bed. School starts for us this week so I need to be on my game. I hope I'll keep up here a little better than I have this summer! Till then...

Bye bye baby mullet

2009-07-04T12:05:00.000-07:00

Well, it was time. Maybe we had a month or more before it got really embarrassing but I decided to just do it. You see, Micah, with-bless his heart-what little hair he has, was getting a baby mullet. I'm sure you're familiar with the term but just in case you aren't, the best explanation is "business in the front, party in the back." ("Oh, ri-i-i-i-ght," you nod knowingly.) So, I plopped him in front of the telly and snipped as fast as I could in between head turns as he attempted to see what I was doing. So, here is a before picture (taken last week) and an after one. Not a huge difference but a relieving one for me!

Busted

2009-07-01T11:24:00.001-07:00

Until recently, our cats, Skimble and Tugger, were the toast of the neighborhood. Every time someone would come by and see the cats in our yard with us they would say something like, "Oh, those are your cats! They are so friendly, especially that one (Skimble). My kids love it when they come into our yard." But sadly their fan club is not far-reaching. Apparently they have been on a killing spree in neighboring yards focusing mostly on birds with even the odd cardinal amidst the list of their victims. Kind of like a Natural Born Killers feline version, leaving a path of dead feathery bodies in their wake. Well, the neighbors are, understandably, not happy about the decline in their backyard bird populations and have, nicely, asked us to do something about our roving menaces. It's not like this is a surprise to us. We've found everything from dead birds to mice to chipmunks to even rabbit legs strewn about our yard (actually mostly under the playset where they lovingly drop each carcass as an offering to us.) But I guess we didn't realize the extent of their destruction. So, as a result, they are currently under house arrest. Someone from the Invisible Fence company comes out tomorrow to give us an estimate on installing one for our cats (who knew they actually did invisible fences for cats?). We have to do something. They can't/won't stay inside all the time, certainly not with all the going in and out of our house that happens on a daily basis and within just a day or two, I'm sure, they will officially drive me crazy. Oh the shame of having a pair of serial killers living under your own roof. Perhaps we can at least contain their massacres to our back yard. Film at eleven...

Springtime in Minnesota...finally!

2009-06-18T17:31:00.000-07:00

June in Minnesota started out a bit chilly for my taste. However, only two weeks in and we have been very busy! I put together a little slide show but first I'll explain all the things we've been up to.
First, we planted a little garden in our backyard and it has been really fun to watch our tomatoes, peppers, red cabbage, spinach and carrots grow away. As you can see, the girls and Micah really enjoyed helping get the bed ready. I did feel strange, having grown up on a ranch, having to go out and pay money for cow manure. It's like buying bottled water!
Then Bethany started what I'm sure will be a long and illustrious career as a soccer player. When I saw her head out the door one night with her shin guards, knee socks, soccer shorts, team shirt and hair pulled up in a ponytail, I was amazed at how grown up she looked. And instead of making me sigh and wish she wouldn't grow anymore, it just made me proud and excited at the privilege we have of watching these little ones become big ones. An amazing privilege indeed.
And speaking of grown up, Bethany is a kindergarten graduate! Since I homeschool Bethany, we have the flexibility to cater her education to where she is academically. At the beginning of the year, it became apparent that another year of pre-school material wasn't going to meet her where she was, so we moved ahead with kindergarten. She's an excellent reader; it's really fun to see her curled up with a book on the sofa and know that she's actually reading it now instead of just looking at the pictures! She loves school as do Anna and Katherine with whom I'm just doing pre-school workbooks and lots of reading. So to finish the school year, we organized a school presentation and invited two couples who are good friends of ours and dear to our children. Diane and Garry Lysiak and Steve and Lisa Odmark, along with their youngest, Claire, joined us for an afternoon of poem recitations, songs and of course, cupcakes! Each of the girls sang a little song on their own, Bethany recited a few poems she had memorized and then together they wrapped it all up with a VERY long song about hopping aboard a pirate ship! Then I had the opportunity to present them each with a little certificate and tell them the things we have seen them accomplish during the past year. It was very sweet time. We were so blessed to have the Lysiaks and the Odmarks share this time with us. The girls enjoyed showing them their school notebooks with all their work from the year. It was a good way to finish the year.
As we approached summer, I realized that we needed to get Micah a life jacket. So you can see him in the slide show, proudly wearing his new Cars life jacket. He really wanted to wear it around the house the day we got it, but unfortunately found that once he fell down, it was very difficult to stand back up on his own. It was pretty hysterical to watch. I videotaped it and if I ever get organized enough to get some video on my computer, I'll post a clip.
Just around the corner from our house there is a little farm where a friend of ours lived and kept some chickens for a while. She and her husband have since moved on (as have the chickens), but her grandparents, the Millers, who have lived on this farm for 60 years, are retiring to an assisted living facility. It's bittersweet for us because we love going to the Millers to look at their big vegetable garden, swing on their little swing and ride bikes on their long driveway. But they are excited to retire from farming once and for all and move to their new place. So, we went over to bid them farewell. We can't wait to go visit them in their new place!
Aunt Rosa came to visit, as she does every year usually about this time. While she was here, we went to the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum with my friend Alisha and her two kids, Abbie and Ben. It is a beautiful place, way out west of the Twin Cities. We had a fun day but had to rush back for our dance recital dress rehearsal that evening. The next day the girls performed in said recital and had a great time. It was Bethany's second recital and she did tap this year. For Anna and Katherine's dancing debut, they did a sweet little ballet. As you might guess, there was a patriotic theme going... Then two days later, I had my first dance recital in 17 years! I had a great time this year taking an adult tap class and performing again was a lot of fun. We danced to James Brown's Super Bad; pretty funky! It was so fun to have Rosa here. She is one of my dearest and most faithful of friends and we have a lot of fun hanging out together.
Then in the slideshow you'll see a random picture of the girls dressing up like daddy. One time after they got out of their bath, I came up to check on them and found them in Joel's clothes! We thought they looked pretty cute...
And then there was VBS...because of our vacation this next week, we attend VBS at the south campus of our church. It's great to connect with people at the south campus but it's hard to GET to the south campus by 8.30 every morning! We've had a fun week and the girls LOVE vacation bible school every year. In the first picture they were dancing around to the Go Fish Guys and in the next picture you can see how wiped out little Micah gets from all the festivities. And just yesterday we banded together with some other kids from the neighborhood to have a lemonade stand to raise money for our VBS missions project which involves providing solar-powered radios to people in far-away lands. These radios help people connect to their local Christian radio station as well as other programs about health and agriculture. Our lemonade stand raised $58 and so far all the kids have raised over $1000. It's fun to see the kids get so excited about raising money for something like this.
Tomorrow is our last day of VBS; Mom, Sim, Caitlin and Lauren arrive mid-afternoon; we pack and clean and then leave Saturday for Cragun's, a resort on a lake in northern MN. The kids are super excited as are Joel and I. Joel's book deadline is tomorrow, so he's really glad to get that sent off and then relax a bit. With any luck in a few weeks, I'll have a slideshow of that trip!

If it looks like a kite...

2009-05-19T19:19:00.000-07:00

...doesn't mean it will behave like a kite. Last Saturday we were planning to have a lemonade stand in our front yard. Our neighbors down the street were having garage sales and so we thought we might have a bit more traffic. However, the day turned out chilly and VERY windy. Since our other alternative was a hot chocolate stand (that's May in Minnesota for you!) and we didn't have hot chocolate or styrofoam cups, we decided (ok, I decided) it would be a good idea to make a kite and attempt to fly it. I thought, "How hard could it be to build a kite?" Really, the question SHOULD have been, "How hard is it to build a kite that actually FLIES?" The answer...well, see for yourself...

Since the kite didn't fly very well (this was probably our most successful attempt!)...

...the girls found other more interesting uses for my little creation!

Oh well, it was better than chasing plastic cups all over the front yard!

4 of my favorites...

2009-05-16T20:40:00.000-07:00

Here are four of my favorite pictures of the kids in action, taken at various times over the past year...(Bethany, Katherine, Anna, Micah)

Like Father, Like Son

2009-05-16T20:07:00.000-07:00

Micah likes to read. He really likes to read. He especially likes to read "The Big Red Barn". He will sit for 15-20 minutes and look at a book. Did I mention that he's 15 months old? Yeah, it's dreamy. Ah, but lest some of you out there with extremely wiggly 2 year-olds start to feel jealous, just remember, this won't last. Which is why I'm reveling in it now and snapping every picture I can get of this cutie in a stationary position.

(this is my favorite.)

Easter Celebration

2009-05-09T19:37:00.000-07:00

The weekend after we returned from England was Easter. That Saturday our church had an Easter Eggstravaganza, a huge Easter egg hunt. Basically, you go eat cookies, see the Easter story acted out and then let your kids loose on 6000 candy-filled eggs scattered all over the church inside and out! Our kids think it's the bomb so we brave the crowds every year. I mean, what's better than getting to eat a sugar cookie at 10 in the morning?

Bethany headed outside with the big kids to hunt eggs (hence, no pictures of her in action), Joel took Anna and Katherine on their adventure and I got to catch Micah scavenging high, okay, mostly low, to get as many eggs as he could pick up and throw at his bag.

So, then there was the ubiquitous "photo spot" where you could gather with bunny ears and flowers and make a futile attempt to get a shot of all the children smiling. Well, believe it or not, we sort of succeeded.

Until a friend said, "Why don't you two get in there and let me get a shot of the whole family!" Yeah right.

In a few weeks, we have to have a portrait taken for our church's directory (yeah, I guess it would be good for the teaching pastor's family to be included), so wish us luck. I figure it will either be the perfect portrait or stinking hilarious, either of which will be okay with me.

Pigeon-chasing in England

2009-04-03T11:52:00.000-07:00

As most of you who read this blog know, Bethany was our first and only child born in England (and in case you are wondering, no, she does not get dual citizenship because we were here on a student visa). So, Joel and I decided that it would be fun to take her back to the Motherland to get a glimpse of her heritage, show her around London, go to Cambridge where we lived, etc. As with most things involving children, the things you think will be fun for them are rather mediocre and they find the utmost delight in other things that would never have occurred to you to be interesting. That's what we get for being adults, I guess. With that said, I present to you a rather unconventional tour of London, through the eyes of a pigeon- chaser.

Chasing the royal pigeons outside Buckingham Palace

Having a go at the art-loving ones in Trafalgar Square just outside the National Gallery (I think they're a bit crotchety, these pigeons, because people aren't allowed to feed them anymore thanks to the Lord Mayor of London.)

Here she is in Piccadilly Circus with a whole pigeon-chasing crew consisting of Benjy Mathole and some little boy who was very committed to the sport. (Benjy said, "But the little boy said we HAD to chase the pigeons!")

The pigeons in Leicester Square, though hipper and better suited to the dizzying nightlife which descends each evening, were no match for our Union Jack-wielding terrifier of pigeons.

The flag really did seem to make her more efficient at her task.

Still at it in Windsor Station, on our way to visit the Queen's "weekend house".

She didn't DARE chase the ravens at the Tower of London but the pigeons were again fair game.

And finally, our last stop, St Paul's Cathedral, wouldn't have been complete without a final dash at the pigeons congregating on the steps of that majestic building.

I hope you've enjoyed our little tour-de-pigeon. I'll try to post more pictures at a later date of our adventures in this lovely country. But with one last nod to true English beauty, I give you:

Little English Girl in the Daffodils

The cousins are coming, the cousins are coming!

2009-03-16T19:02:00.001-07:00

Well, today was a super exciting day in two Lawrence households. Preston and Madison were awakened at about 5.30 am (Preston says it was exactly 5.37 am) to the news that they were flying to Minnesota to spend Spring Break with their cousins! And our girls, who were privy to the plan since its inception, have been gearing up for a week for their arrival. (We discovered that for our girls, building up the big day is more fun than being surprised. The last time Preston and Madison came up, I surprised the girls and when we walked in from the airport, they stood there dumbfounded so it was kind of anticlimactic!) And it was a super special day because Madison turned 4 today - YAY, MADISON! So the girls and I had fun decorating - Madison had requested a Hello Kitty theme - and making a special Hello Kitty cake. So, here are a few pictures from our first fun day together. I hope to put up a slideshow soon of the rest of the festivities. (And, yes, little Micah was in the van too; you can just make out his little foot right beside Bethany, poor thing!)

All I want for Easter...

2009-02-23T20:08:00.000-08:00

...is my two bottom teeth! Exactly one month ago, Bethany lost her first tooth. Today she lost her second one! Her first one was literally pushed out by another tooth you could clearly see just behind it (they call it a shark tooth, because of the rows of teeth that sharks have). So, you could hardly tell that she even lost a tooth! She was excited to use the dollar the Tooth Fairy brought her to buy a new pair of purple sunglasses at the dollar spot at Target. Almost immediately, the second tooth started to wiggle and today as I watched her pushing it horizontal with her tongue, I said, "Bethany, let's pull your tooth!" She looked at me, started pushing her tooth with her tongue and then reached up and took it out of her mouth! So, here are the pics!

Celebrating Micah

2009-02-21T20:08:00.000-08:00

At last I've gotten together a slideshow of our time at the Eagle's Nest celebrating Micah's birthday. The Eagle's Nest is a very cool indoor play place at a local community center. It has a big kid's section and a little kid's section (the Eaglets' Aerie, how cute). We went with Bethany's best friend Claire and her mom, Amy. Bethany had been before with Claire and loved showing Anna and Katherine around. It's a great place with tunnels all over the place, a maze of punching bags, a huge ball pit, a small climbing wall and a big double wavy slide (a smaller version of the kind you see at state fairs). The little kid side has a little ball pit (which, as you can see, Micah loved!) and a few other little bits and bobs to crawl around on. Everyone had a great time and it was a fun way to celebrate the little guy.

Happy First Birthday, Micah!

2009-02-13T08:20:00.001-08:00

It is hard to believe that this little guy is already 1! The time has absolutely flown by. We had a simple celebration this morning with blueberry muffins (his first!) and some video-chatting with Nanny and Simbo. Sadly, Joel was unable to attend due to his last day of intensives at school. But we will open some gifts this afternoon and plan an official party (complete with an iced cupcake or something) in a few weeks with our friends Matthew and Sarah Taylor whose daughter Stella is one month younger than Micah. So, here are a few pictures of the festivities!

2008 - The Year in Review

2009-02-01T22:22:00.000-08:00

The biggest news of 2008 was the birth of our fourth child and only son, Micah Lewis. In keeping with our holiday-themed births (Bethany the day before Thanksgiving, Anna and Katherine on Halloween), little Micah was born after a fast delivery on February 13th. Sadly, being the 4th child he got only an email announcement. Nevertheless, he has been and continues to be one laid-back little dude. He loves to watch his sisters run around the house and giggles every time Mommy or Daddy helps him walk across the room (his most recent accomplishment!). It's hard to believe he's almost a year old. So life with four has been a busy, fun adjustment that we are thoroughly enjoying.

In April, my sister-in-law Michelle came up with their kids, Preston and Madison, to surprise the girls and stay with us while Joel and Kent were on their annual men's weekend. It was wild with 6 children 6 and under in the house but tons of fun. We even decided somewhere in our twisted brains that it was a good idea to pile everyone in the car and go to the Mall of America.

In June, we had our yearly trip to Cragun's, a lake resort about 3 hours north of the Twin Cities. We always have a great time with my mom and step-dad and this year we were joined by our niece Caitlin and later in the week by her sister Lauren and mom Melanie. Our girls absolutely LOVE having the big girls around (and so do we - READ: built-in babysitters!). We always spend the week playing in the sand, swimming in the pool and eating ice cream at The Chocolate Ox.

In late July we made the trek back to Texas to not just attend but be IN my cousin Monica's wedding. The girls were flower girls and I was a matron of honor. We had a great time celebrating with Monica as she married her high school sweetheart, Zach Glenn. The girls danced the night away and had an amazing time. And, I mean, what's cuter than little girls in poofy dresses and flowers in their hair?
While in Texas, we had a great time swimming in Grandma and Granddad Lawrence's pool (I think we literally swam every day for a week and a half!) and hanging out with the cousins, Preston and Madison. We also enjoyed some more time with my brother and sister-in-law, my dear Aunt Jan and Uncle Turtle, my cousin Lisa and her family, Joel's adopted sister Sonya and her family and, of course, my dear friend Rosa. It was a whirlwind but we had a great time (in spite of the insufferable heat!).

Following the resignation of our campus pastor to take another position in the Twin Cities, Joel was asked to become the interim teaching pastor of the White Bear Campus of Calvary Church. Calvary is a one-church-two-campus model, with a senior pastor who teaches primarily at the South Campus in Roseville and is in overall leadership of the church, along with the board of elders, of course. Joel began his stint as interim in September under the plan that the church would evaluate our future -which church model we plan to adopt, where we are heading, etc. - in early 2009. That evaluation is currently going on and Joel continues to happily fulfill his role as interim teaching pastor. He is enjoying the opportunity to be so involved in the local church and feels that it augments his job as a professor. Apart from needing to be a bit more organized around the house and me being the only one around on Sunday mornings to get us all to church, it has not been a difficult transition at all. It's exciting to be a part of this vibrant and growing church and we are blessed as a family to be invited to participate in this way.

In the fall, we had fun at our usual haunts like the apple orchard and the pumpkin patch and even took a quick trip up to the North Shore of Lake Superior. Let me tell you, Minnesota is quite a place! It was breathtaking to drive into Duluth and see mighty Lake Superior stretching out before us. I really found it hard to grasp that a lake could be that big! Of course, all the children were asleep at that particular moment, but they enjoyed the waterfall and the lighthouse we visited just north of there. We stayed in a lovely little cabin right on the lake at Beaver Bay and the girls (especially) enjoyed hiking out to a rocky point just out our back door. (There was a lot of, "Ok, girls, when you are hiking, you MUST look where you are walking.") And while we were kicking around the North Shore, our kitchen was being painted! So it was exciting to come home to a "new" kitchen. And the fall also meant the starting up of "official" school with Bethany. Since she just turned 5 in November, she is not scheduled to start kindergarten until this year but I tried to keep to a decent schedule anyway. Right about the time of her birthday, reading clicked for her and it was so fun to watch her read one of her Bob books to her little sisters. She loves learning and actually has to fight her little sisters for school time since they want to have Little Girl School too! We have a lot of fun together and I am thoroughly enjoying thinking up lesson plans and just watching their little minds work.

We celebrated Thanksgiving with some friends from church and hosted my mom and Sim and Joel's parents here during the Christmas holidays. Nanny and Simbo, as they are affectionately known, were here in early December. There was, of course, the making of the Ba-Nanny Split Cake and some rather strange winter sports with Simbo, including shovel-sledding and wheelbarrow riding.
And of course, there was the obligatory trip to the Dora Mall (aka, The Mall of America, home of Nickelodeon Universe, an indoor theme park) and the mandatory consumption of ice cream. Yeah, you can bet our kids just HATE it when Nanny and Simbo come to visit! Oh, and did I mention they get to drink coffee every morning with them? As usual, it was a very fun time and went entirely too fast.
Then Bill and Lynna came up about a week before Christmas and stayed until just before the New Year. It was a very laid-back time with Bill enjoying brisk walks in the snow up to the local Caribou Coffee and Lynna helping the girls with their new puzzles at the kitchen table. We also continued an annual tradition of going to see Macy's 8th floor display. It's different every year but this year's was A Day in the Life of Santa's Elves. It's a fun little thing we've done the past two years. The girls enjoy wearing their Christmas dresses one more time and seeing all the mechanical elves and animals and eating a Christmas cookie. We really enjoyed all the time with Grandma and Granddad (did I mention the hot chocolate every morning?).
So, 2008 was a wonderful year for us, full of exciting beginnings. We feel so blessed and are so thankful for the Lord's kindnesses to us during 2008. We are looking forward to being a part of what He's doing in 2009. And we're thankful for all our friends and family who love us and pray for us. Come back again for more Minnesota Chaos!

Check back soon!

2009-01-27T19:31:00.000-08:00

If you have recently received our "New Year's Card" and came here to get the scoop on our lives, please check back in a few days! I am working on a fuller update to post to fill everybody in on what 2008 looked like for us. If you didn't receive a card, it means I don't have your address (or I ran out of stamps for the moment!) so send it our way. For the time being, enjoy a little picture of Micah's first day in the snow (in his EXTREMELY baby blue snowsuit - a bargain buy for $3.99!). He absolutely loved crawling around in it until he face-planted near the slide. And he giggled the whole time I pulled him around the yard on the sled. What a cutie!

Oh Santa!

2008-12-25T10:38:00.000-08:00

And Santa's big delivery was a dollhouse for the girls. They were thrilled and slightly amazed at how big it is! (Well, when you've got three little girls clamoring to cram their Kelly and princess dolls into tiny chairs, it pays to have a big house!) Oh, and little Micah, who is content to push empty water bottles around the house, got a monkey-ball from Santa. ("I wouldn't give his troubles to a monkey on a ball!" {obscure Letterman sort-of-reference}

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-25T10:09:00.001-08:00

Well, at exactly this time last year, Anna and I were at the Children's Medical Center in the ER waiting to get the gash in her face stitched up after falling out of my arms onto the leg of an upturned stool. (No, it was not pretty.) So, I'm thankful to report that as of noon on Christmas Day 2008, there have been no accidents. Well, okay, there was the pecan cookie reaction that Bethany had last night at church which precipitated me racing to Walgreen's to get some Benadryl (she was fine). Oh, and Micah crawl-tripping over some shoes and bumping his face on the mudroom cubbies which resulted in him biting his lip (he was fine). All in all, though, it has been a lovely and relaxing Christmas for us. And I just wanted to share a little peace and joy with you all.....:)

Random pumpkin-carving picture of the Boy

2008-12-01T20:12:00.000-08:00

Ok, I know you don't come to my blog to see pictures of our laundry, so I decided I just HAD to upload this hysterical one of Micah attempting to clean out our pumpkin for carving at Halloween. A picture is worth....

Thank God for tumble dryers

2008-12-01T19:31:00.000-08:00

So, our dryer died last week. We had a repairman come out and tell us we'd be better off buying a new one than sinking money into this one. So, we wait. And waiting is not a huge problem. The problem came when the repairman said, "Oh, sure, you can continue to use this one until next week. Just make sure it cools down between uses." Buoyed by the fact that I got a load of Mom and Dad laundry washed and dried, I boldly tossed a fairly large load of kid clothes in the washer (we had run out of panties). And even though the dryer has now had a full 36 hours to cool down, it will not work. So, I'm stuck hanging up a ton of very small t-shirts, footed PJs etc. This is what ONE load of kid laundry in the Lawrence household (lights only) looks like. In case you're curious, that's 33 hangers' worth, not to mention the 18 pairs of very tiny panties hanging around the house (strategically placed over the heating vents). I realize that people all over the world get along swimmingly without tumble dryers, but I am thankful I don't have to be one of them!

Multitasking

2008-11-29T20:17:00.001-08:00

Most of my day is spent multitasking, especially when it comes to nursing Micah. Nurse the baby while I eat breakfast and check email in the mornings. Nurse the baby while teaching Bethany about inches and centimeters. Nurse the baby while reading a book to Anna and Katherine. But at night in order to calm Micah down enough to get him in bed, I have to sit alone with him in his quiet room for the last feeding. I'm thankful for this forced single-tasking experience. I can't even read a book because he is distracted by the page-turning. So, I sit and look at the walls in his bedroom and think or pray or watch him. Tonight he was holding onto the soft sleeve of my tee shirt, running it through his fingers. If I would move my arm away, he was intent on finding that sleeve again. And he was content, blissful, really. The way a little baby should be. And so was I, doing only one thing.

2008-11-28T12:10:00.000-08:00

Well, she won. Michelle has been after me for months to start a blog. I told her that once Micah starting going to bed at a reasonable hour, I would have a go at it. So, here I am. We'll see how well I can keep up with it!

The family picture above was taken at the recent Butterfly Ball, our birthday celebration for Bethany (5 on November 26th), and Anna and Katherine (3 on October 31st). We all dressed up and enjoyed watching 9 little girls run around in fancy dresses and butterfly wings! It was great fun! More pictures to follow....