Artistic License

My 7 year old decided to take the camera and take a few pictures of her sister. I had no clue this was going on until I decided to download the pics and found these beauties in there. I actually laughed out loud when I found them because this is exactly how I picture Cecely. She is a ham.

She also loves posing as if she is a fashion queen. Anyone that knows her knows she brushes her hair at least 15 times a day and puts all kinds of product in her hair. Yes, she is in fact a diva.

This face is classic. I mean really who does she get this from?

Now you see why I am constantly laughing. These girls make me smile and laugh out loud many times a day. This was such a treat to find these pictures.

Something is Missing

Sorry, there will be no pictures on this post. I just wanted to let all of our friends and family that may not have received texts or email that our sweet little foster baby went home to live with his great grandma yesterday. It has been a whirlwind of things over the last couple of weeks. We knew of course when we got him that this could happen. When you sign up to be a foster parent one of the big questions you ask yourself is... "will I be okay when these sweet little people leave my home and go to be with family?" You want them to be with family if that is truly the best option. If everyone is rehabilated and well that is always the best option. However, we also are in the foster to adopt program so we eventually would like to adopt if that option presents itself. I guess it is hard because we got P when he was 5 weeks old and now he is 5 months old. He went from being a newborn to a happy smiley baby in those 4 months we had him.

He was an angel baby. Such a huge blessing in our family. When we found out on Friday that his Great Grandma was getting guardianship of him my heart was broken. We had the weekend to love and snuggle him. I had to give him to his GGma yesterday morning. I kept feeling like something was missing all day. I was supposed to be feeding my little P. I was supposed to be changing his diapers. I was supposed to be snuggling him and listening to him babble and talk. I was supposed to be wiping that slobber and kissing those cheeks. I was supposed to be loading him in and out of the car when I ran all my errands. Instead of doing all that I just felt like something was missing all day.

My older girls cried when they had to say goodbye to him before they went to school. After all they were all little mommies to him. As Bailey was getting ready to say goodbye to him she whispered in his little ear "I hope you remember us". I told Bailey that his Spirit would always remember us. I truly believe that.

Even though it has been extremely hard these past couple of days, the past 4 months have been an incredible blessing. Little P was loved like no other. He made a huge impact on our lives

Happy Birthday Bailey Boo!

For Bailey's birthday this year she wanted to invite friends over and have a hat party! One of our good friends Diana brought some awesome paper to make the hats out of and the kids had so much fun making pirate hats. They spent quite a bit of time putting stickers and coloring their hats! They were very creative. Aislynn literally spent over an hour making her hat.

Trevor is a very good friend of my girls. He spent a lot of time decorating his hat and even had a theme.

Here is Audrey and Bailey. They have been in school together for two years. They really love eachother. Bailey was so glad she got to come over!

Here is Devonney doing what she does best :) She loved all the stickers and the crayons. She felt like she was a big girl! She loved the party and thought it was all for her!

For her birthday she got to take cupcakes to school. Her favorite, strawberry cupcakes and cream cheese frosting. She had such a wonderful day at school. She is getting so big. I cannot believe she is seven already! What happened to my little baby girl? Bailey we love you sweetheart! You are such an incredible blessing to our family! You make our family so much better. I love you Bailey Boo

A boy and his mommies

Here is one of Pax's mommies. Bailey cannot get enough of this little man. She is really good to him. She is always loving on him and making sure he is comfortable. Can you tell she is smitten?

Here is the Pax man. He is such a great baby. He is so calm and so smiley. He can also get this really intense look while he is trying to figure things out. He arches those little eyebrows and gives you his " shhh I'm concentrating look. " He is hanging out while I cook dinner.

Here are the rest of his "little mommies". He is often crowded out by all these girls. He doesn't mind. He smiles and coos and shares his slobber with them. They are fascinated by him and are constantly telling me the new things they see him do.

He is hours of entertainment. Such a handsome little dude. He has everyone wrapped around his finger.

Need I say more?

Swim Lessons

This summer would not be complete without swim lessons. My really good friend and I go to the Rec center here and stand or sit rather in line for over 2 hours just so we can have our kiddos in swim lessons. It is well worth it. It is such a nice diversion for two weeks. Plus the kids come home and are exhausted. This year we had Aislynn and Bailey in a class at 10 in the morning and then Cecely was in a class at 10:45. So my friend and I ended up staying for almost two hours everyday. With five kids it was always interesting that is for sure. This is Bailey and Trevor on the last day of swim. They get to have a free day where they can go down the slides and off the diving boards.

This is my water baby Cecely. She loved her swim lessons. Here she is swimming under water. I was worried when I put her in swim that she wouldn't want to do it, but she proved me wrong and I am so glad! She made some really good friends in her class.

This is what Paxton did for the swim lessons. He just slept mostly. Or he would look around and smile and coo. He is such a laid back baby. It made it so nice since I was basically running around the pool area trying to keep Devonney from jumping into the big pool.

Another water baby of mine. This is the kiddy pool. While the big kids were in their lessons the little kids had fun splashing around in the little pool. The swim instructors were nice enough to always let us have some toys and things for the little ones to play with. Devonney loved the water and didn't mind going under at all. She is my no fear girl that is for sure.

Here is Cecely getting ready to go off of the diving board. She was brave. I had to coax her a couple of times but after that she was ready to do it on her own. She did a great job and loved her teacher and her friends. Even though it was a little tough sometimes to wrangle five kids it was well worth it. My children love to swim and are learning to love the water. I grew up swimming and loving the water. Some of my fondest memories are in the water with my dad. I hope my kids can have great memories like that too!

TROUBLE

So there are a lot of words that come to mind when I think of my 19 month old. She is the most adorable, chubby, loud, persistent, snugly, mamas girl around. There is another word however that describes her pretty darn well and that is TROUBLE. She is into something all day long. She loves to wear every ones shoes and then when her sisters go to look for their shoes they are no where to be found. She is so sneaky about where she puts them. These happen to be my shoes and yes, I had to look for them after she was done.

She never wears headbands or hair bows. After I put them in she immediately pulls them out and then says "Here Here Here" and wants me to put it in and play the put in take out game. But seriously how can you not love this face. I have to admit I am hooked. It has been that way since I found out we were having her.

She then proceeds to pose around and try and walk like a fashion model. Her older sisters have taught her that. There are quite a few other things her sisters have taught her too!

No girl is complete without a furry fluffy dog on your arm. Or in her case in your hand being dragged around all day long. She loves these dogs even more than our own dog. Max and Devonney haven't been getting along lately. Max is a stealer of food. If you leave it somewhere it is fair game and he will eat it. Devonney does not like that and has been known to chase him around the house throwing her fake doggies at him to get her food back.

What can I say.... I love my children. Each of them has a special tender place in my heart. Even though she is a tornado.... I love her to pieces and would not have it any other way.

How does your garden grow?

My garden of children tends to be growing quite rapidly :). They are getting bigger everyday. I tend to feed them at least 12 times a day. Maybe more on some days. Notice Bailey's grumpy face. I give them plenty of sunshine and lots of water. I find that good ole TLC works wonders on them. They definitely grow where they are planted. I try and make the growing conditions and environment just right, but you know sometimes they are a little picky and wilt a little. So that is where the TLC comes in :).

My outside garden has been growing by leaps and bounds too. We have gotten some monstrous squash and zucchini. We have been really blessed with how much we have produced this year. We have frozen a ton and made lots of yummy casseroles and given lots away.

My herb garden has been fabulous. We have had homegrown herbs in all of our food and we can really taste the difference. Each of the girls got to plant an herb. They have done such a wonderful job of watering them and taking great care of them. Of course we helped Devonney with her herbs. She mostly wanted to pull them out and eat them. We have Basil, Oregano, and Thyme.

Every day I would go out and water and would find about this many ready to pick. The girls had such a fun time helping me pick the veggies. We also have wonderful tomatoes and peas. Even being out in the desert things still grow in abundance. It has been so nice to have home grown veggies this year.

I put a pencil to show the size of the zucchini. They are so huge. I can get about six cups of shredded zucchini out of each one. It is fabulous! My family has eaten a lot of zucchini bread this summer and I am happy to say that even my picky eater loves it!

Horseshoe Meadow

One Saturday we decided to take our little family on a hike to Horseshoe Meadows. It's a little less than two hours a way. It was going to be 110 in Ridgecrest so we decided to escape the heat and go to cooler places. We packed up the family and the snacks and all the gear and headed out! The girls were so excited. I am not sure about Paxton, he basically slept in the carrier that I had the whole time. He was pretty content. Here is me and Bailey walking at the beginning of the trail. It mostly looks like sand and some trees for the first part of the hike.

The girls found some incredible dead stumps to play and pose in. They really were beautiful(the logs and my girls).

After a little ways were came to this beautiful lush meadow. There was an incredible creek that ran through it. Some man was fishing and volunteered to take a picture of our family. We stopped here and had a picnic. The girls just ran around the meadow and kept crossing this log. It was so much fun!

Here some more pics of my beauties! It was such a good family time for us. It was nice to get away from the heat. It was a lot cooler there. The girls had so much fun seeing all the wild life. We are really blessed to live in such a beautiful area. We may live in a small town but there are so many places that aren't too far away that are perfect for a getaway!

Here is my bushy husband and my other beauty. Devonney rode on dad's back most of the way. She got out to play in the water and run around the meadow. She was worn out by the time our adventure was done! We had a wonderful day and made even better memories!

Some New Additions!

We have a new addition to the family!! And no I wasn't secretly pregnant and didn't tell anyone. We have a new little foster baby that we are taking care of and his is such an incredible little man! We have had him for a month now. We got him when he was 6 weeks old. He is now 10 weeks old and such a cutie!

He loves loves loves to be held and talked too. The girls love his smiley face and his coo's and all the baby noises he makes. The girls are all little mothers to him and let me tell ya the boy has got them all wrapped around his little finger.

He is such a calm sweet spirit. He is always so happy and content. He is such a wonderful little spirit to have in our home no matter how long or short that stay may be. His name is Paxton. The girls call him baby Pax or little man for short.

We have been doing all of our paperwork and getting background things done and all the stuff needed to become foster parents. It has taken us almost a year but the wait was well worth it. We feel so blessed to have him in our home. It has taken some getting used to with all the boy parts of changing a diaper and all the blue . He is such a handsome little guy. I love his hair and his big excited expressions.

And of course I love to watch him sleep. With all of my kids I have loved these pictures. They are so precious.... We will enjoy him and love him while we can!

Long time no see!

I know it has been forever since we have posted anything. Most of you probably think that we have moved away and our living underground somewhere. Well, we are in fact alive and kicking! I have so many pictures so you will have to bear with me and read the many posts in the near future. I am going to try and be better about blogging. NO PROMISES! Okay so these pictures of course are of our cute little thing Devonney. She is still so short! However what she lacks in size she sure makes up for in personality. She will be eighteen months in June so the nursery leader decided that the babies coming in June should come in and have a little Easter egg hunt with the older nursery kids. Devonney had a blast. She sat in her little chair and ate her snack like a pro. Of course she wanted to get up and walk around with her snack but all in all it went pretty well. It was a little sad to see her in Nursery. I know she doesn't go for another month and a half.... but still.

I had to cut her hair because she had the nice mullet going on! Her hair was much longer in the back than in the front. So off it went! It looks really cute in the little bob. No more business in the front and party in the back for her! She is into everything and talks non stop. A lot of it you have to guess it sounds a little like klingon but it works! She loves her sisters and loves to play whatever they are playing. She just started wearing 12 months stuff. She makes me laugh everyday and is quite the little ham. If you give her any sort of attention and laugh at her she will do a complete comedic routine for you. Right now she loves to throw anything and everything in the toilet and in Max's water bowl.

She is non stop but we love her and are so grateful that she is in our family. I hope you enjoy our post! More to come.