Freeze Time...

I just love to watch my kids sleep.  It's such a beautiful time to see them relaxed and dreaming about who knows what...

Madison and I took a nap together on adjoining couches and this was my angle of her sleeping.  It touched me so much that I took a picture of her.  She sleeps just like her daddy with her arm up under her head.  I love this girl so much that it hurts sometimes.  She is a true angel and is always striving to be like Christ and follow His example.  I am blessed to be her mom.

Madison turns 5 today

 Sam, Eden, Charlie, Cherish, Amelia, Chloe, Abby Madison, Matthew from Left in a circle around.

It was five years ago today that I gave birth to a tiny 6 lb. 12 oz. baby full of dark hair, sideways cone-head, tiny hands and feet who changed my life forever.  She has taught me patience, how to love unconditionally, unselfish service, how to dress (She loves to pick out my outfits), do my hair (she tells me what she likes), what shoes to wear to look 'bootiful', the power in the words "thank you" and "I love you", and what it means to be like a little child as Christ said.   Some things I love about her are when I ask her to do something or get something for me she says, "sure" almost 90% of the time.  She is great at cleaning up her messes and loves to do arts and crafts...she could do them all day!  She has a great imagination and can play by herself for hours with just a few toys and her imagination.  She gives the best hugs and kisses and is the first one to comfort anyone when they are hurt.  She loves to share and when she was in nursery she saved an animal cracker through the entire nursery hours so that she could give it to Abby after church.  She loves to help me clean the house wether that is sweeping, vacuuming, dusting, moping, or washing windows, she sticks by me the entire time.  She has a beautiful testimony of her Saviors love and how he does answer her prayers, which she gives with the purest heart and true faith.  Tonight we sat together on her bed while she told me how she wants to be a fairy and have magical powers to make any toy she wanted and how she would turn us all into fairies so we could fly.  Then she went on to tell me about a princess who could talk to animals...after 15 minutes or so I gave her a kiss and hug and she climbed into bed.  It was a beautiful moment and I'm grateful to have had it with her.  Thanks for coming into our family Madison.

Thanks Mason and Aiden...

Madison and Abby loved the package and know who it's from.  When I asked who sent it to them Abby said, "Mason".  Then I came down Monday morning and they had strewn the Easter grass over the entire living room and themselves.  It was staticy and clung to Abby, Madison, the hard wood floor, the balloon, etc.  It was fun to clean up to say the least, but they loved it!  Thanks again Lacey for the package.  It made the girl's day!

My friend's newborn shoot

 Isn't he just a doll?  I love pictures of baby's with their daddy's hands in the picture.  He was so good for the entire shoot.

I love it when babies yawn.  He was getting tired at this point.  More to come soon on my photography blog

Then came the snow on April 18th...

 Not just a little bit of snow either.  The girls had enough to make 4 snowmen in 20 minutes with Brian.

 I had to dig out the snow pants and snow boots.  I really thought Spring was coming.  Good thing we didn't plant a garden yet:-)

Abby loves to eat the snow...lots of it.

Madison and Abby 5 and 3 Year Pictures

Madison was scheduled to get her fake tooth out Tuesday, so I had to get her five year pictures before that happened.   We went Sunday morning in the freezing, windy cold and took a few.  These were the best ones.  I can't be picky when Spring won't come:-)

Literate Birthday Girl!

I am so grateful to have Abby in our family.  She is so sweet and full of life.  Now that she's three she talks about how tall and big she is.  I just don't want her to grow up so fast.  I love her smile with her one dimple and cute thumb sucking teeth.  Last night she wouldn't share her barbie with Madison and as Brian was putting them to bed Madison said her prayers and prayed that Abby would share her barbie with her.  He then went to Abby and listened to her prayer which went like this:  "Dear Heavenly Father.  Please help me to share my barbie, but I can't.  In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen." and then she hopped into bed with her barbie in hand.  Well, it was fun to celebrate her birthday and see her get excited about it.  All she requested was a Bell cake.

 I was reading a book and so Abby opened up this book next to me and would just turn the pages one at a time and concentrate on the picture-less pages and then turn it again.  

 Happy Birthday...Brian was working late and so we had a party on her birthday and then celebrated it the following night with Brian.  These girls are so funny together!

 Here is Abby's Birthday cake.  It was done in marshmellow fondant.  It was suppose to be Bell, but I only had pink paste die, so it's Sleeping Beauties dress on Bell the barbie doll.  It was fun to make and Abby was so happy to have a princess cake.

 This was after we made it, they both just wanted to touch it:-)

 Abby showing off her presents from Grandma and Grandpa Evans.

Showing her present from Grandma and Grandpa McVea...can you spot Abby?

 Dress on Fire.

Abby blowing hard! 

Random Happenings...

 This looks like an add for drinking water don't you think.  I love her chocolate brown eyes like her daddy and unruly hair...she won't let me do it now:-)

 This is Abby's latest trick.  Instead of taking the time to rub the 'soft thing', as she calls it, under her nose to suck her thumb, she now just sticks it up there and sucks.  This way she has a free hand at all times.  Pretty in innovative for a young-in.

 Sisterly love.  I just love how they are such good friends.

 This is where most of the soft things originate from.  It's a pillow with these pom pom type things on it and Abby skillfully takes them off, wads them up, and rubs them under her nose.  We find them everywhere around the house and you can always count on Abby asking, "where is my soft thing?"

 These are just a few I collected around the house in a few minutes to take a picture.

 Mardi Gras King cake this year.  It was so fun to make and we had some friends over to celebrate with us.  Our friend Dan got the baby:-)

 The kids cake with about 14 little trinkets in it for them all to get one:-)  They loved it!

This is the girls being silly one morning playing with their shadows on the wall.  I love this stage in life!!!!

Miracle....

Miracle of the dry pull-ups

Madison is such a deep sleeper and has been her whole 4 ½ years of existence (minus her first 3 months of life).   This was great until she was getting older and was still waking up in the morning with a soaked diaper.  She wasn’t too concerned with this until Abigail started waking up with dry diapers.  At this point it became a sore spot for Madison.  So, I did what any parent would do and put a diaper on Abby at night too so Madison wouldn’t feel bad.  Well, then Abby woke up with wet diapers too.  After a few months of this Abby started to wake up again with dry diapers and Madison got very sad one night and was crying asking when she would be able to wake up with a dry diaper.  She never had woken up with one and I really didn’t think she would be able to for a while.  Her daddy wet the bed until he was 9 years old!  I just thought she got her daddy’s genes.  But that night her heart was truly breaking with despair and so I had Brian talk to her about his bed wetting days and how every body is different.  To this Madison said, “Will you fast for me?”  Brian agreed and also told her we could do other things like stop drinking water at night.  We put this into effect and Melissa, CL, and VV, and I all fasted for Madison that next fast Sunday.  I had little hope and bought cloth pull-ups (3) and was ready for the long haul.  This made it so she could pull them up and down and continue going to the bathroom until she fell asleep.  Well, about two weeks after she was using the cloth diapers and would wake up wet and could feel it, she had a dry diaper out of the blue and has had three dry pull-ups in a row.  This is a miracle and she even told me this morning that she wakes up in the night and goes to the bathroom.  Who would have thought she could wake up and go!  I know this is an answer to prayers, fasting, and the faith of a child.  She knows her Heavenly Father loves her and I have been overcome with feelings of gratitude as He has answered her prayers of faith.  She got her princess umbrella this morning for having three dry diapers and is just elated.  Thanks for all those who prayed and fasted for her.  She is one happy girl!

I love WINTER!

We had a snow storm the other day after having nice spring weather for a couple of days where we even got to see grass for the first time this winter.  It was exciting and nice and then the snow storm on Sunday.  We got about 5-6 inches of snow.  Brian got stuck going up a hill by our house on his way to work and had to walk home and get me to help him get out.  We bundled up the girls, put them in the jogging stroller, and headed to the car.  As we arrived at the hill there were at least three other cars that were stuck as well.  The plow hadn't gotten to this road yet and it had the 5-6 inches of snow.  We shoveled, pushed, poured down salt and was finally able to free Brian's car and send him off to work.  Then I got to help three other people who were stuck before heading home with my freezing girls.  They were such troopers and let me help one more person on the way home.  I brought them in and turned on the TV and went out to help one other person who was stuck.  It felt so good to serve people who couldn't help themselves.  They were stuck and spinning out and no matter how hard they pushed the accelerator they weren't going anywhere.  I found myself grateful for the snow and the opportunity to serve people I have never met.  I then shoveled some walkways and parking spaces.  I have been reading this book of ten strategies for being a mom and under the title it says:

"10 things I learned by accident because I had children on purpose" 

In it she talks about finding joy in the things we have to do.  It's so funny, positive, and uplifting.  She has a way with words and making light of what can at some times be breaking moments in a mom's life.  It has made me more grateful, frugal, laid back, and able to focus on what is most important.  I am able to laugh about situations and just move on knowing that in the future this will not be a big deal:-)

Rigged the Deck

Today for quiet time Madison got the Uno game ready and kept asking me to play with her.  Once I finally finished finances she had it all set up and I sat down to play at her little table.  As I picked up my deck, yes, a deck size hand and then looked at Madison's hand it was much smaller.  Then she began to lay out her cards hidden by a puzzle box standing on end.  Out to the sides I saw a lot of black...she had rigged the deck and had all the wild and draw four cards.  I then spread out my hand and saw only two colors...about ten of each.  I then told her that was cheating and with a huge smile spread across her face she said, "I know."  I told her I would play, but that was being dishonest if she was playing someone else.  She actually did win the game, but barely:-)  It was so fun playing about 10 rounds of Uno with her.  When she looses she just laughs and when she wins she does the same thing.  She is such a good sport and fun to play with.  Whenever I change the color she will say, "oh, that's perfect." and then look at her cards to see if she even has that color...if not she says, "but I don't have that so I will pick up."  She calls wild and draw four cards "goody" cards. I have loved spending time with her.  She loves playing games as of late and would rather play a game of UNO then get a book read to her at night.  Although we have gotten into story telling lately and so last night Brian told Madison and Abby the long version of Joseph and the coat of many colors.  This morning when Madison came into my room she asked me to tell her a story like how daddy did.  She then went on to tell me about Joseph and had so many of the details that I couldn't even remember off the top of my head.  Like what the dream the baker had...she remembered that he baked a pie for the Pharaoh and then birds came and ate it.  Brian grew up with his dad telling him Bible stories at night and is continuing the tradition with our family.  Thanks Rick for doing that!

We also just sat at the computer on Sunday night and looked at old posts on my blog way back to when Madison and Abby were born.  It was so fun.  Now the girls are always asking for stories about them when they were little and then repeat back to me other things I have told them too.  They love it!  What a fun family thing to do.  I have Brian to thank for that.  He is always telling the girls about when they were little and the funny things they did, random things about them, and what we did when they were little.  It makes me rededicate myself to blogging since Brian and the girls enjoy it so much!

Abby's workout

Since Brian and I go to the gym 3 times a week or so, Abby has become interested in working out and every once in a while she will do her "workout" as she calls it.  It consists of stretches mainly, but is so cute.  I was trying to read the scriptures and Abby was insistent on working out first.  I finally convinced her to read scriptures and then she can work out after.

Abby's Dance Moves

Abby loves to go and get her princess dress on and then dance to either "Girls just wanna have fun", "bubble gum", or "Living la Vida Loca".  She is so funny!  I love this girl.

Ice Rain...what do we do?

 We were about to go out and then realized there was ice rain so decided against it.  This is what we ended up doing for fun...

What are they doing?

 Madison is such a mom and whenever Abby is sad, Madison's solution is to tickle her back and hold her.  It seems to be a cure all in our home.  I came into the living room one day and Madison was holding Abby and tickling her back.  

Madison and Abby coloring with their babies.  Madison can color for hours...Abby lasts about 10-15 minutes max.  They have fun together.

Madison and Abby the Chefs

 Gotta love the goggles...it's must help with the mixing:-)

Madison is so proud of her oatmeal she made by herself (with a tiny bit of help).  She would have oatmeal every morning if I let her.  She loves the stuff.  One time I made extra and put it in the fridge so they could just go down and get it themselves.  Well, when I came down that morning they both had a spoon and were eating it cold out of the same tupperware.

Kalahari...America's Largest indoor water park!

 For Brian's last week off for this academic year we splurged and took the girls to Kalahari Resort in Sandusky, OH.  It's only two hours from our house and we got a room, access to the indoor water park, free breakfast, a percent off our dinner, and the life jackets and tubes are included!  It was so much fun and since it was during the week it wasn't crowded.  We plan to make this a yearly thing during the winter!  It was under $200 including gas, food, lodging, indoor play area, and access to the water park for two days!

 This is Brian, Abby, and Madison in the wave pool.  They loved it when the waves would come on and flip their tube.  Brian made it so much fun!  Madison said, "I loved the wave pool the best.  I liked it when the waves weren't going and daddy would chase us and be funny."  Madison also went with Brian on many of the slides.  Her favorite was the roller coaster one...

 Abby loved playing at the Giraffe spot (it was a kiddie area with two giraffes at the entrance).  She loved just playing in the water and doing whatever she wanted.  She wouldn't take off her green wrist band for 4 days after we got back home just in case she could go to the water park.

They had so much fun together and want to go again with Mesia and Anna:-)  Dan had the week after off...we missed you guys.

Madison and Abby in the Hotel Room...

The anticipation to go to the water park was overwhelming...they were so excited and just loved our new home, as they called it.

Brian's Mad Skills...