Busy, busy days!

 Picnic on the patio

 Noah was there too.  He especially enjoyed the peanut butter crackers.

 Watching Daddy play a game 

 Noah discovered that he's strong enough to move the chairs around.  He put two of them behind the front door.  I've had to break him of this new game because I don't want my floor scratched up and I don't want to ever be trapped out by him.  LOL

 Watching Daddy make Pigs in a Blanket.

You turn your back for one minute.... *Sigh*  The boys emptied the paper drawer of the paper shredder.  (If you are worried about safety...it's never plugged in and you have to move it clear across the room just to plug it in and all the blades are deeper than any little fingers can go...)

Emma and Julia are twins!
(She's so excited because usually Abby commandeers this twin dress combo for her own doll and herself.--I need to get some more fabric and make some more doll/girl clothes.)

 "Mom, take a picture of me like this."

 Brothers!

He's the clown of the family....

...and he knows it....

Hahahaha!

"Hat!  Hat!"  (He LOVES my dishes.)

I told him we were going to make koolaid so he put the pan down and threw these packages of koolaid into the pan...all by himself.

Then, when I took them away, he ran to Emma and cried on her.  If Daddy is not around to tattle on me when I hurt his feelings like that, Emma is his first choice.  He LOVES his Emma.

 How I found him dressed after naptime one day.  He put the skirt on all by himself and was so proud.

How I found Julia one day.  :)  Hahaha! 

 "Mom, we are sleepy!  We want to take a nap."  Abby said one day.
I follow them upstairs with a smirk and these three lay down on the bed.  (Emma was wore out and already asleep on the floor somewhere else.)  Abby plops in the middle and the boys lay down then she "read" the dinosaur book to them.

 And naptime was then over for her and Isaiah as they were no longer sleepy...but this little guy didn't get a choice.

 He's a chicken

see these trees?  Look close...Someone discovered how to climb...

 It's an Emma-bird!

 Abby found a new way to swing

 Emma can't swing because Noah follows her around and tries to sit under her

 So Noah get's captured in his own swing sometimes...

(Can you tell he should be taking a nap now?)
(Also, the girls have been taking on the morning routine of getting everyone's hair brushed and teeth brushed and clothes on...so isn't he cute in his little "rag-tag" outfit consisting of pajama pants?  hahaha!)

 Fruit for Breakfast! 

 He is NOT happy because Isaiah is picking on him.

 At the museum of Science and Nature...or something like that.  I forget the name.

 It was rainy and cold outside

 Noah is either kissing the wolf or trying to drink the water in the puddle.  I don't remember.

Emma was actually pretty scared of the wolf statues.  (Behind us in this picture maybe 30 feet are some "wolf tracks" made in the cement.  I think Emma was worried they would come alive and get her.)

 Noah really liked them.

 bunny under the wolf's leg

 This was Isaiah's favorite part.....

Look at that face as he looks at it!

 not a good picture but there are two of this swimming kind hanging from the ceiling

Butterflies!  All colors!  Wow!

We learned about the life cycle of a butterfly in home school and it was pretty neat that we got a chance to see these exhibits.  :)

 His favorite one?

 We got to play in the mud/sand/mess

 We got to "hike" up a "mountain" and slide back down.

 A shot of how huge the museum is.  We did *maybe* half of it and we were exhausted!  I didn't even take pictures of all we did.  It was pretty fun!  Plus, it's free for military and dependents (except for the special exhibits/movies) but there is a TON to see...so we'll deff be back!  

"Mom!  We found a worm!"

...

 ...and the worm was.... a slug.  LOL

They LOVED it.  LOL 

 Actually, they found two but I didn't take a picture of the other one.

 Waiting for lunch and then a nap for at least one little person here

Cute...look how similar they look!

Noah fell FLAT on his face on our wood floor.  I think he tripped over his own feet.  Anyway, there was a LOT of blood and I was worried.  I cleaned him up and found a tiny cut on his lip.  The cut was from the edge of his pacifier where it broke.  I think the pacifier acted like a mouth guard this time and protected his teeth from getting knocked around because you can see it took a pretty hard hit.

We went to Sarah and Michael's house to celebrate Isaiah and cousin Hadassah's birthdays.  :)
As an added treat, we got to see Mama Lynn, Papa, and Elizabeth!

 London Bridge!  Noah didn't want to go through the bridge, he wanted to BE the bridge.  :)  LOL So he and Papa made their own bridge.

Abby played

Sarah made Isaiah a dragon hat

 It's the coolest dragon hat ever!!!!

 More presents

And we can't forget the siblings

Liz likes the tent.  I think she needs one for Christmas.  ;)

"It's so hot in here!"

 Noah started pretending to be a dog all by himself.  Emma and Isaiah joined him.  (But I don't have a picture of Emma down like a dog.)

"Woof!"

Waiting for Fondue!  We do fondue sometimes and it's a favorite with everyone.

Look at Isaiah!  He's sooooo excited!

After the cheese and chocolate...when Brandon and I had eaten our fill but they were still going...

And this is the reason everything is covered...

Do you think they like it?

 This is usually the cleanest under-5-face around the table... 

 ...usually...
Even the non chocolate lover loves chocolate fondue

 "Mom, we're not done!  There's still chocolate in there!"

 And...now Daddy is upstairs running bathwater and Mommy is stripping the kids and making sure no one touches anything....

But it was sooooo worth it!

 The girls can do the laundry... (I keep a few stools in the kitchen just for them to help with stuff like this...and I put stickers on the washer so they know what the buttons are supposed to be pointing at.)

 They discovered a million tiny baby spiders and they wanted me to take a picture

 Sisters!

 Hunting Easter Eggs again.  :)

 The boys got a head start because the girls were not being obedient so they had to wait a few minutes.

Then the girls joined in on the fun

 Noah:  I just know there's one up there.  Now, how do I get it down.  (See the one he could get in the grass not far away going totally unnoticed)

 Emma: "I'll help you Noah."

She can't reach it either.  Hahaha !

Abby, Isaiah, and Emma trying to get these.

No one is tall enough

 Another one he walked right over

 Abby discovered a way to get them...and then Mommy decided to get the rest that were up high...

 All done

Colorful waffles!  :)

 Coloring pictures for Daddy because we really miss him when he goes away for work sometimes

He wants to go outside.  Can you tell?

 Helping me mop

Soooo helpful!  (Abby is saying, "I want to mop now.")

He even put his blanket up on the table so it wouldn't get wet...see it in the background?

22 weeks pregnant

 Doing Chores.... This was actually NOT his job but Abby and Emma looked like they were having so much fun putting stuff away he decided to help while I went to relieve the pregnant bladder.  

Washing dishes

THIS is what he was supposed to be doing....

 Playing in the sprinklers...
It started like this:
We were playing outside and the kids were complaining, "We're so hot!  We want to go swimming!  It's so hot!"
So I found clothes for them to get wet in and had them fetch dry clothes and towels and whatever we'd need afterward so we wouldn't track water all over the house, and we changed clothes and all of this took something like 20-30 minutes.  Then I turned on the sprinklers. (I LOVE our in ground sprinkler system!  How awesome is this?)  And Abby ran through the sprinklers...

A lot...

While the other's watched...

The wind was blowing and it was getting us on the patio a little

Still watching Abby play

 Watching Abby have all the fun without us

 Emma: "I'm so cold!" (She's BARELY wet.  :)  Hahaha)

Abby still playing...the rest watching...

 Finally Isaiah braves the mist blowback water and walks down the rocks barefoot to stick his finger in the spray...

 Noah joins him...

 Hey, this isn't so bad.

 Noah walked all the way back to the patio in the spray...

look at his tongue!

Standing like "I'm wet."

wet...wet...wet...

 and he was done.

Isaiah was still playing...mostly on the rocks...

Mom, I'm wet.

And I'm not going out there again.

Isaiah still playing

Abby and Isaiah getting wet

 Abby is getting cold now

I want this, now, please.

 "I'm FREEZING!"  (She's still BARELY wet.  LOL)

 Wrapped up in a towel on the porch

 Coming back down the rocks to the towels

 Wet...

 ...but happy!

...and we are so done!

I set the sprinkler to go for 30 minutes.  When I went to turn it off, I found it had run a total of 10 minutes.

*I told them not to come in until I could help them dry off and get in clean clothes.*

soooooo

 This is how I found them when I got back from the garage where I turned the sprinklers off...

Then we played in the yard on the swings

and I picked super mean weeds. 

What are these things?  Yuck!  They hurt you through 2 layers of gloves!

I know they will probably come back until we poison them or something, but they were so mean I had to do something with them.  I couldn't stand them anymore!

 *Tips learned from picking all these nasty weeds from the yard:
1)Water the whole yard.  Go figure the ones that got wet actually came out a lot easier.  Didn't think of that.  Ooops!  Go figure I actually did that part of the yard last because I didn't want to be wet for long... 

2) find better gloves.  I had some worn out ones and I ended up layering two gloves on one hand and still got stabbed so much!  these things are mean!

3) bring a screwdriver.  I remember this dandelion picker thing we had when I was a kid and I wanted something like that but didn't have one so brought out my screwdriver instead...It didn't work like the dandelion thing did BUT it worked better once I devised a new way to work it.  Stab the screwdriver down in the dirt along the stem of each plant and wiggle it under the plant to kind of push it up.  Do this from 2-4 angles and then pull the plant.  You get the whole root and it pops out easily.

I got EVERY sticky plant I found in the back yard.  (I filled an entire diaper box and they are packed in there.)  The kids kept begging to help me.  I kept telling them, "These hurt!" and they kept trying it anyway barehanded.  

Then...

...after a long day of playing in the sprinklers and picking weeds...

We learned about tadpoles and frogs (and toads) this year in Home school, but our experience with them has been limited to toy frogs around the house and images in the book. (and the bigger kids might remember seeing some at the zoo or something.)

 When Brandon came home from work, there was a toad hopping around our yard. So he brought it in. We considered leaving it in the bucket until morning and letting the kids see it in the morning...

But we were afraid he'd make noise all night and beat himself up against the sides of the bucket since he was pretty freaked out.

 So Brandon woke them up. Abby popped up right away and came down to see the toad. She was pretty excited about it. Venturing a touch, but he was jumping around so frantically, she was a little scared.

 Looking at the toad...

 Waiting for siblings to slowly make their way down the stairs...they are not alert enough to be excited.

 Still looking....

 Brandon carried the boys down. They were too tired and were just standing at the top of the stairs like little zombies. (It's about 10:30 at night because of his current job hours....)

See the towels?  I thought we'd try the sprinklers again in the hottest part of the day and see if they like it better so I didn't put them away. 

Emma was still making her way down the stairs...
Isaiah was so tired he just stood there and cried.
Noah is watching it but is pretty passive and not showing either joy or fear. (In retrospect, perhaps we should have waited until morning.)

 Looking...

 Watching...

 Sitting on the floor and crying... Poor baby!

 Abby likes it at least. LOL

Noah is watching it pretty well...

Emma finally appeared. (Yes, she slept in clothes. You pick your battles.) She was pretty scared of it.

Toad calming down in the corner.

Abby's first touch.

Too tired to care.

Watching

Toad climbing the wall with Brandon's help

"I smell freedom!"
Notice Noah's looking interested.

Abby touches it again.
"Want to touch Noah?"

Abby helps Noah touch it.

Isaiah ventures a small quick touch on my lap.

More tears and it's obvious he just wants to go to bed. We showed the kids the toad's belly. Isaiah gave it one quick touch on the belly and we got a little smile but as I was running the camera, it was hard enough to get these pictures.

Noah after a quick touch of the toad's belly. "Do you want to touch it again?" His little face wrinkled up and he shook his head and backed away. The head, he could deal with...but that squishy belly... LOL This cracked me up so much!

Letting the toad go back outside so he can find his breakfast and go back to his home.

"Bye toad!"
Noah was the last one to head back toward the house. Abby and Isaiah were the first ones back in bed.
In the morning, "Where is our toad? Can we get him back? We want to play with him again!"
LOL