What a sweetie, eh?

3, 2, 1…Jump!

They were playing make believe here…”Ahhh…we’ve washed up on a deserted island!”

Just so you know, they did not want to go on this “Keep Off” lifeguards chair.  I made them.  I thought It’d make a cute picture.

I love this on of Elijah and his good friend Navinah Riley.  Chivalrous, that Elijah is.

This might just be my favorite picture ever!

Noah, running from mischief, probably.

Elijah’s foot.  In case you’re wondering, this is also the size of one of my feet.

Awww…Elliekins.   Wow, can you believe she’s almost 11 months old?

The Fam.  Five out of seven are actually looking at the camera.  Not bad.

Swinging.  So much fun.

That’s paint on Phoebe’s face, by the way.  We – that’d be me with all five kids in tow, my first real outing alone with all of them. (!) I’m very proud of myself – had a lovely excursion to the Minnesota Children’s Museum yesterday, and face painting was one of the many fun things that we did.  Phoebe and Noah came home looking like Native American war heroes and Elijah and Zeke like baseball players.

As soon as the snow cleared this spring Zeke started practicing the wiggling maneuver used to propel himself on his RIPSTIK.  He soon found out that it wasn’t as easy as it looked.  He fell…a lot.  But he kept at it.  And fell a lot more.  His elbows took the brunt of most of his collisions with the sidewalk.  Ouch.  Me?  I would have given up.

But finally – like overnight – Zeke figured it out!  Now he’s cruising all over campus.  I love this picture of him doing a U-turn and the concentration evident in the tongue curl.

Of course, it simply would not do for Zeke to have a skill that Elijah didn’t have, so now Elijah is determined to figure out the RIPSTIK too…

Boys…everything’s a competition.

Now could all three of you look at the camera?  Just once.  And smile…or at least not look weird.  Please?

Not gonna happen.

What better place is there to watch a game of football catch anyways?

Yes, school…let me explain.  For the past couple of months Noah has had the privilege of attending a Christian Montessori preschool (for free!). There is a training centre right here on the college campus, and recently they invited children between the ages of 3-6 to attend.  It’s a beautiful thing. The students in the training centre have real, live children to “train” on, and my kids are learning about everything from geography to prayer to sewing. (Yes…sewing!)

So…now that Phoebe is three and potty-trained she can go with Noah! How cool is that?  She was so excited today, and it was so cute to watch them walk over together.  It’s literally a stones throw away from our front door, too.  Well… depends on who’s throwing the stone, I guess.

Phoebe had a birthday fit for a princess. We had a party for her last evening with some other little princesses and princes. Here she is waiting for all the royal guests…

This was her big present.  She hopped on and started peddling like a pro.  It was very cute.

Here, also, if you’d like to take a peek, is a little slideshow that we prepared for “Phoebe’s 3rd Birthday Ice Cream Cake Social.”  (Dave came up with that name for the Evite – makes me giggle.)

Really not sure how this happened, but my little newborn baby girl is 9 months old today.  That went by way too fast.  Why does a 9 month pregnancy seen like an eternity, but these precious baby days seem to zoom by so fast?  *sigh*

Go Phoebe, go Phoebe, go, go, go Phoebe…