Brother and sister

Thanks for the great present Grandpa and Grandma Belding!

Mud Magnet

With all her girly ways and love for shoes and accessories, Corrie has still got a side to her that loves adventure. She can hang in there with a very rough-and-tumble big brother, and if there is mud within a mile radius...she will find it. 

The other day I let the kids outside after we had a little rain. I think there was a tiny mud puddle on one side of the yard somewhere. Judging by how covered in mud she was, you would think there was a giant mudslide by our house.

Corrie, we love seeing all the parts of your personality! (I am thankful this house came with a washer and dryer too).

Mac

For a while there, Mac didn't really have any words to say to us. Then he eventually developed a sort of Asian-like babble that he would use continuously...we just wondered when we would ever understand a word he was saying.

Well, he has finally broken through the language barrier, and all of this waiting has not disappointed us!

Some of the phrases he uses are so funny and sweet...where does he hear these things? Here are a few things I heard him say recently:

When he woke up to find a house full of guests eating breakfast with us this weekend, he ran in the kitchen with a huge excited smile and yelled "This is SO CRAZY guys!"

Today he fell down on the walkway and said, in a matter-of-fact way: "That's the biggest fall I ever seen."

When I need to leave him with a babysitter for any length of time, he always comes up to me with a giant hug and says very sweetly, "mommy, I lost you."

Sometimes when I get him out of his carseat, he lays his head on my shoulder and says, "that's my mommy."

And the kicker of the quotes came this afternoon at the grocery store. I looked up from surveying the cheeses to see Mac standing up in cart and proudly holding out his finger saying (quite loudly), "Mommy! I have a wonderful booger for you!"

Good Morning, Crazy Hair!

Buddies Day

Thursday was a very special day for four little buddies. Jack, Cal, Mac and Corrie got to spend the whole day together in the beautiful sweltering heat of North Carolina. 

They started off the day with a little jaunt outside in the front yard...the classic activity of choice for this group. This picture captures each of their unique personalities and interests perfectly!

As usual, Mac was happily pushing something the entire time. In the picture below he is saying "I going round and round, faster and faster!"

Calvin spent his time running around an imaginary cross-country course that wound down around the tree on the side of the yard, up through the various driveway obstacles, and around the tree on the other side of the yard (all in his blue sandals, which somehow always ended up on the wrong feet). He would always stop and pose for me in the grass after each lap :-)

   

Corrie split her time between posing on the green bike and pushing the lawnmower. She insisted on wearing the hat and backpack outside: accessories are non-negotiables! 

And Jack enjoyed maneuvering the green bike around curves and playing with the blue "baa-aa" (ball). One plus of Jack's lack of volume control when talking: I can always hear him, even with a deaf ear! As you can see, he is very cute :-).

    

By the time we got back inside, we were all ready for watching a little Thomas & Friends before lunch.

After naps, it seemed like a great time to enjoy the other side of the yard: the side with the water hose. Transporting water from various containers to other containers just never seems to get old. What does get old is wildly shaking the little orange watering can so that water splashes in other buddies' eyes (*cough* Mac). In the end though, no one seemed to mind getting a little refreshing shower :-).

                       

The next morning, Mac and I were up earlier than everyone else, and when we got downstairs, he looked around and said, "Mommy, where's my friends?" Guess he's gotten used to his buddies :).  It will be fun to see how the "buddies" group grows over the years. 

And, on another note:

Remember what I said about Corrie and accessories? On the drive back up to VA, we stopped at a Mall for lunch in the food court. We walked around a bit to stretch our legs, and Corrie did an awesome job of holding my hand and staying with me the whole time. That is, until she saw this display!

Family Hike

A few weeks ago, Ellis came home unexpectedly at a very early hour. It just so happened to be beautiful outside, and we decided it was the perfect day for a family hike.  

We thought we should pick a nice short loop...just a little something to give us a breathe of fresh air so the kids could be back in time to get a nap and Ellis could catch up on his work. I said, "No problem, I know just the hike!"

Yeah...

We went on a hike with Kelly and Dan about a year ago, and I thought I remembered it being pretty great. (The fact that it was a year ago should have been the first red flag that maybe we might not end up where I thought we would). But, as you can can see from the pictures, we still had a pretty great time.

Mac was so excited that he pretty much ran the entire time.  Here he is running back to get us...mommy and daddy hike so slow!

Mac kept yelling, "Come on Guys!!!!"

Finally, he found a good little log to sit on as he waited for the rest of us to catch up :-)

Here we are, a few miles in and Mac is still running. Ellis kept offering to put him the backpack, but those little legs just kept going!

Mommy and Corrie just enjoyed the scenery at a nice pace. See that glove Corrie has on? And the hat? Yeah, those went missing for a while before we noticed they were gone.

We finally got to the end of the hike and we realized my memory may have been a little foggy...We came out to the road (wasn't part of my memory), and by this time even Mac was ready for a rest in the backpack. We had no clue where we were, but we were pretty sure we had at least a few miles to hike back up the mountain!

We eventually got tired and desperate enough to start flagging cars down to ask them what mile marker we were actually at. The first car said we were still 5 miles away from where we parked our car. My first thought was "Woah Nelly...this is gonna be a long time hiking along the side of the road!" Thankfully, it turned out that we were only about a mile away. And we got some good pictures of the beautiful views.

And we got a super cute picture of Corrie. I think she knew we would be getting back to the car soon :-)

Remember how I mentioned that we went on a hike a year ago with Kelly and Dan? Well...I guess it's been a about a year since we looked in the pockets of the hiking backpack. These sippy cups were filled with milk at one time...

Makes me want to play and coach again