How Observant Are You?

Can any of you tell what is missing from this picture??

Sweet and Stinky Boys

Today at lunch:

Micah: Mommy, we wont be here to watch you die because we'll already be married by then, right?

Me: That's the plan.

Josiah: But why are you going to die first?

Me: So I won't be lonely.

Josiah: But then daddy won't have anyone to kiss!

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Josiah got in trouble for something the other day and he and I were snuggling after the "talking to" he got. All of a sudden he got up and ran out of the room saying, "I have to go somewhere!"

A few seconds later, he waltzed back into the room with a smirk on his face and said, "Do you know where I went?"

Me: "No."

Josiah: "I had to go TOOT! And I knew you wouldn't like it if I tooted on you, so I went to another room! Wasn't that nice of me?"

My dear, your thoughtfulness astounds me

Well, Micah thought this was just about the funniest thing ever, so after rolling on the floor in full appreciation of his brother's "thoughtfulness," he gets up, runs out of the room and says, "I've gotta go somewhere!"

Josiah is cracking up laughing now, too, and chases after Micah. A few seconds later, Josiah runs back in the room, his face RED with laughter and says, MOMMY!! DID YOU HEAR THAT??!"

Me: "No."

Josiah: "Micah tooted and it was like, PBTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT!"

Isn't that soooo amazing?!

Micah comes around the corner at this time. Josiah turns to him and with total admiration says, "Micah! How did you do that?!"

Micah assumes a semi-squat position and says, "I just bent over like this and my tush was like, PBTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT!"



If you don't have or have never had or weren't a boy yourself at some point in time, you may not appreciate that last story. I, for one, am proud to report that I maintained a straight face during the entire exchange and when it became obvious that it was a contest the boys had no intention of ending, I promptly put an end to such smelly boy behavior.

However, I CRIED when I was telling John the story and I very nearly peed my pants, too, though being pregnant may have something to do with that. At least I've got them trained to go in the other room, right? Their wives will thank me someday. Now, I've just got to work on John....

I Can Take a Hint

Ok, so being pregnant and taking care of three kids and homeschooling isn't the easiest thing I've ever done. There's been a shortage of available energy in my life lately and as a result, some things just aren't getting done like I want them to be or like I usually do them. I've had to cut priorities a bit...you know, scale back to what's really important and what really needs to be done. I mean, REALLY.

Take bath time, for example. Now, USUALLY I give the kids a bath every other day, but recently I've been making exceptions to that. I mean, do my kids really need to be clean every other day?? I'm just soooo tired at the end of the day! John normally gets home at 8:30, by which time all the kids are in bed, so on bath nights I'm trying to work up the energy--after dinner time, which incidently IS one of those things that really has to happen every day--to get three kids into the bath and bed on my own. Yeah, that just doesn't always happen like it used to. Soooo, sometimes the kids will go 3 and yes, even 4 (gasp!) days without a bath. I console myself by remembering my childhood when I'm pretty sure I only took a bath on Saturday. So, twice a week--that's pretty good, right??

My kids have an oh-so subtle way of pointing out my short-comings. Today we were playing outside when Josiah came up to me and said, "Mommy! I finally figured out why this fly wont leave me alone--it's because I SMELL!"

And then, like all good little boys, he lifts up his arm, takes a whiff and says, "See? Come smell me! I SMELL!!"

Ok, ok. I will FIND the energy to bathe you. Maybe there's some stuffed under the couch cushions....

HOW Could I Forget??!?

I can't believe I forgot to tell you about this in my post yesterday...pregnancy brain strikes again!!

Sooooo...on Thursday we had our 20 week ultrasound for our new little one and it's a...











HEALTHY BABY!!

Ha-ha! Seriously, I debated long and hard about finding out the gender this time. I don't know why. I really never cared before, but this time I actually kinda wanted to know. My will-power won out in the end (though I was doing a count-down at the end of the ultrasound!) and our last little baby will be a surprise like the rest of 'em! :) I really do love the surprise...I'm still not sure why I wanted to know with this one. But, to also keep you fully in the loop, if I had to guess as to what this baby is, I'd have to say girl because...well, lets just say that double estrogen in my system would explain a lot right now!!

So anywhoo...our little baby is perfectly healthy and happy in there. The tech said s/he weighs 13 oz. right now and has long legs. I don't really have any good pics from the ultrasound to share--baby was pretty squirmy, so you'll just have to take my word for it that we have a perfect little one on the way! :)

WonderWorks, Pigeon Forge

Yesterday we took a family field trip to WonderWorks in Pigeon Forge. I've been finding there are MANY buisinesses and museums around that have special days or special rates for those of us who choose to homeschool and WonderWorks was a particularly cool one because we all got in FREE! Gotta love that!

None of us had ever been, so we didn't really know what to expect, but it was amazing! There was so much to do there--we spent 4 hours there and still didn't get to do everything! Some of the exhibits were "too old" for my kids, but there was so much to do and explore that it didn't really matter that there was some they couldn't do. Even Emilia got in on some playing around...she was especially fond of the big piano!

Josiah said his favorite part of Wonderworks was the magic paint wall. And the second most favorite was the TV that could make you look like Ooompa Loompas and the last most favorite is the swap body TV where he and Micah got to switch upper and lower parts of their body.

Micah's favorite part was pretending to do magic on the paint wall and the "steady hand" metal shapes where you had to try to not touch the wire with the wand (like "Operation").

We had a blast there! We will definitely be going back next year for free homeschooler days! :)

Here are the boys practicing their pitching. This neat little set-up let them try to strike out the batter and it told them how fast they were throwing. Josiah really had fun with this!





Ahhhh...my little space babies :)







This was one of Emilia's favorite things--a big, huge piano!! She had so much fun running up and down the keys and making beautiful music! :)



Josiah and John making big bubbles in the bubble room:





Here's Micah workin' the air cannon:



Ha-ha! Josiah had me cracking up at how he was laying on the bed of nails--I guess he was just taking precautions in case anything unexpected happened! :)



This is the best I could do at a picture of the magic paint wall. The wall would sense your body heat to create the colors. It was really cool!



That's all for now--we've got soccer again tomorrow and hopefully I'll remember the camera this week so I can take some pictures. Micah is playing this year, too, so it's double the fun!

My Super Six Year Old!

Can you believe Josiah is SIX??!?

Don't worry, I can't either. (I also cant believe it's been a month and a half since I posted, but that's a different story...)

So...he's six. It takes TWO hands for him to show everyone how old he is. He's started Kindergarten. He reads like a champ (seriously, he read a whole chapter book before breakfast one day). He loves to be a helper, but if I'd let him he'd park his butt in front of the T.V. all day long! He plays soccer, takes karate and has decided our driveway isn't big enough for him and his bike, so he's started off-roading in our yard. He's basically your awesome, outstanding six year old boy. And I'm still in shock that he's SIX.



This year for his birthday he wanted to have a bowling party. It was really fun and I think Josiah could have bowled the night away! He bowled 3 games and in his last game he got a strike and 2 spares!!

Here's his bowling lane cake:


Josiah and his cake...it melted a little in the car:


The cousins ready for some cake!


The bowling crew:


And, of course, the birthday boy opening some of his presents:



We had his party the day before his birthday, so we had to come up with some fun stuff to do ON his birthday, because I just think birthdays need to be celebrated! In the morning we all went to the Bounce House. For those of you who don't know, it's a place that has a bunch of those inflatable slides, etc, for the kids to play on/in. Everyone had a blast! Emilia wanted sooooooo bad to keep up with the boys, but she's just too little for most of the inflatables. We did take her down the big slide MANY times and she LOVED every second of it!









After the Bounce House, we went to lunch at McDonald's (his restaurant of choice!) and then to see the movie Monsters vs. Aliens. It was a fun, busy day. All of us were exhausted at the end of it!

Happy, happy birthday, Josiah! We love you so very, very much!!