He had a birthday!

Last week Will turned 6 years old! I can hardly believe our "baby Will" is such a grown up boy. He is such a gentleman and has the sweetest heart. He can also be all boy and just wants to get dirty, climb trees, play in the creek, and wear camouflage.

For his birthday, he chose to go to Papa's cabin. Jay took the 3 big kids and spent the night at the hunt cabin. The next day, Papa took them fishing. Will and Catherine each caught a fish. Papa cooked them for lunch and they ate it right up! They also shot BB guns and had lots of fun hitting the targets. 

 For lunch, we had pizza and fruit and chips with the cousins and family. Will requested cupcakes for his birthday treat. You can see how lovely and homemade these were--straight from the Publix bakery! On his actual birthday, he requested my homemade banana pudding so I treated him to that.

Will, we love you so much and are so proud of the wonderful young man you are becoming! You're such a special part of our family and are so much fun. Happy birthday!

Tball!

Will started on a Tball team a few weeks ago.  He has always loved baseball and is really excited to be on a team this year. 

As we are discovering, doing a team sport is a full family commitment! He has games two nights a week from 5:30 til 7pm and sometimes has practices on Saturday mornings. It's only a 7 week season, so the chaos will be short lived. In the meantime, we are trying to keep 4 other kids entertained at the ball fields and feed everyone a late dinner a few times per week. 

So far he has had two games and has loved them! He also loves that his best friend from school is on his team. Before his first game, he wanted to know if we needed to buy tickets to his first game and how many fans would be there! 

It's really entertaining to watch a group of 5 year old boys chase after a baseball, give their best swing at bat, and slide into home base just for the fun of it. And then there's the kid who is standing in the outfield yelling "mom, I need to go potty!" And the kid who randomly comes out of the dugout to the stands to give his mom a hug. Pretty cute! 

So here's to our first Tball season! 

His happy place

The beach is James's happy place. Honestly, he has been more content and relaxed at the beach than anywhere else he's ever been. He loves the sand, loves the water, and plays so hard that he naps and sleeps without fussing. Happy happy indeed! 

And today, he took his first steps!! I'm not at all surprised that he did it at the beach. Our Little charmer; he's so much fun! 

Enjoying the game

The boys went to Atlanta on Sunday to enjoy the Reds game! Such a treat for them to cheer on their team!! 

Brotherly love

There's not much in the world that melts a mama's heart like a five year old boy who loves his two babies. Will adores them. One of my favorite aspects of having lots of children is watching their interactions and relationships. James and Elizabeth are very blessed to have a big brother who loves and protects and plays and laughs and comforts them. Sweetness indeed!

a little bit of spring

I love flowers. If I had lots of extra time I would play outside in the yard all day. Maybe in heaven God will let me play with the flowers and gardens.

In the meantime, I do a little bit here and there in our yard. When we first moved in (3 1/2 yrs ago) one or two little clumps of daffodils popped up in late winter/early spring. Every year since then, I've tried to plant more bulbs. I really like having random flowers growing in the woods. We've had such warm winters the past two years that they have actually started blooming in January.

I've also recruited a really cute yard boy. He's a five year old named Will. He loves to help dig holes and plant bulbs and flowers with me. The girls think they want to help, but about 15 mins later they declare they're done. Will will stay out there for an hour or more until we get the job done. He also really likes to trim bushes and trees :) Just give the boy a pair of garden clippers and he's really happy.

When I look at our yellow blooms, I enjoy them even more because I think about planting them with my boy. 

Ice Skating in our 70 degree winter

Will's class went on an ice skating field trip this week. The kids had a great time. The walkers are a huge help when you have about 25 four and five year olds on ice skates! They liked crashing into each other with them, a strange bumper car type activity. Will was adventurous and tried skating some on his own too. His favorite part was throwing snowballs, especially at his teachers. He also really liked taking a sled ride with his friend Sophie. He thinks she's really pretty :)

It's humorous that this is the only winter activity we've had around here. This weekend it has been 70+  degrees. The daffodil bulbs are coming up, cherry trees have blooms on them, the kids are outside in shorts and short-sleeves. Kinda crazy for the middle of January. So we have to play with some pretend snowballs and go ice skating inside!

When you don't want to leave

Yesterday our good friends came over to play. Will loves, loves, loves to play with his buddy Eddie. They can become quite adventurous together. They spent a solid 4 hours outside cutting down trees and branches in our woods, including the poor pine sapling pictured below. We did convince them to come in for lunch but otherwise they played outside the whole day. We would periodically go out and check on them and they are usually fairly responsible, so no big deal.

Jill yelled out the door at about 1:15 that they were going to be leaving in 15 mins. We packed up the baby and her things and she headed out to the car. A couple of mins later she came in and said she couldn't find Will and Eddie. I went outside as well and we started yelling for them. No response. I put on my tennis shoes and started walking around the edges of our woods while yelling for them. No response. I went down and checked the creek, the fort, even Will's secret hideout. No response.

By this point, I am having to talk Jill out of calling 911. I go deeper into the woods, still yelling their names. No response. I check the neighbors pool, still calling them. no response.

Take every thought captive---don't panic. Where are the boys??? Lord help us find the boys.

After a solid 20 mins (which is a very long time to not know where your child is) I finally catch a glimpse of Will's yellow shirt and hear them. They are deep in the woods hunkered down behind a log, underneath some brush.

"Boys, did you not hear us calling you?" "We don't know. We didn't want Eddie to go home. "

So there they were, hiding in the woods, with their acquired treasures they found on this hike-a dog leash, 2 golf balls, a beer pitcher, and a plastic plant container-- so that he wouldn't have to leave.

Good grief. About gave these mamas a heart attack.

Lets just say there was some discipline that occurred as a result. I love that Will wants to play outside in the woods. It's one of the reasons we moved to this house. But for heavens sake, answer your mother when you hear her and see her frantically searching the woods.

Boys!

Student of the week

Will was student of the week for his class this week. His friends all wrote on a poster what they like to play with him or why they're glad he's their friend. He also took some pictures to share and filled out a questionnaire about himself. Here were some of his answers:
Favorite tv show: the Cosby show
Favorite toy: football
What he wants to be when he grows up: a preacher
His favorite place to go: the beach
What he likes learning about: hunting, building, and superheroes

He's so much fun. I love to see how he approaches the world, a totally different way than how I see things. He's one of my favorite people to hang out with.

Picture day

This is how Will wanted to dress up for picture day at school! He's so funny!

Slumber party

What happens when daddy is out of town? A slumber party!

Will tosses and turns and isn't actually in his sleeping bag Please note that Eli, the dog, is curled up on Will's sleeping bag though.

Catherine has her trusty clock. What kid uses a clock as a security blanket? Apparently she does.

Anna finally fell asleep approximately 1 1/2 hours after the others. She's our late night party animal.

I'm sure Jay is enjoying a quiet, peaceful but lonely hotel room.

Will's Birthday (lack of party) Celebration

This one--this crazy wonderful boy--turned 5 years old yesterday. Oh how I love him. 

Sometimes I think back to when we were first pregnant and at my first dr's appointment they couldn't detect a heartbeat. I went back the following week and there was a heartbeat, but it was slower and weaker than it should have been. All I could do was pray for this little baby and ask our creator God to give and sustain life. And He did. He gave Will a strong heartbeat and lots of life. And I am so thankful. I can't imagine our family without him. 

We've had five wonderful years with him so it was time to celebrate!

 Will loves to DO things--so his main birthday presents were things to keep him busy: a new wheelbarrow for helping in the yard, a big boy bike, and a tent for camping. Such fun boy gear.

We celebrated Will's birthday this weekend. Instead of having a big party for each child's birthday, we are planning to do a party for each of them every 4 or 5 years and on the other years just pick a fun activity or dinner to do with a friend or family. This year Will said he wanted to do something with his friends Eddie, Nolan, and JC. They are his 3 best friends, but they don't know each other so we opted to do individual activities with each of them.

We scheduled to go to the park on Saturday morning to play with Eddie. It was raining and dreary and cool that morning. You know you have good friends when they will drive 45 mins with 3 small children to play at the park in the rain :) Will and Eddie had fun swinging, climbing, running, riding bikes, and just getting dirty in the rain and puddles. And we had the entire park to ourselves (because no one else was crazy enough to go that morning.)

Eddie's little brothers Charlie and Wyatt joined the fun too.

Anna had lots of fun, although she didn't love that her pants were wet from the rain.

Will loved riding his new bike at the park. He's super fast.

And this sweet big sister has a hard time every year on Will's birthday because she wants it to be her birthday. Here she is very grumpy at the park because of some disagreements about bike riding. But she does love her brother. He's her very best friend.

On Saturday night, we invited Nolan and his family over for dinner. Will picked the menu of sloppy joes and mac-n-cheese. It was low key and the kids ran around and played and enjoyed having fun together.

Will's friend JC was supposed to come home from school with us yesterday to play. It was also JC's birthday, so we wanted the birthday buddies to have fun together. Unfortunately JC was sick, so we have to reschedule.

We ended the day with dinner at Mimi and PopPop's. Will again chose the menu, this time spaghetti with meatballs and chocolate chip cookies for dessert.

So that was Will's birthday (lack of party) celebration. I'm sure it makes my friends Rachel and Deborah cringe. They throw awesome birthday parties. We had no theme, no birthday banner, no party favors, nothing of the sort. But my boy had a great time and we celebrated his sweet life and he loved it. Good enough by me.

Happy Birthday sweet Will! We love you!!

Pet Show

Today Will's class had a pet show. Some people brought real pets. But when you have to get five kids ready and out the door, you don't take the dog too. Especially our crazy Eli. So Will opted to take his monkey. Perfect!

What was really funny was what happened as we were getting everyone in the car to go to school. Will had gone outside to play while I was feeding and diapering babies. When it was finally time to go I kept calling him, but he wasn't answering me. After a few minutes of this I was getting really frustrated because he wasn't coming to the car and I couldn't find him.

Finally I caught a glimpse of his shirt through the trees at his tree fort. I yelled again for him to come get in the car. By now I was starting to lose my patience. Then he says "but I'm stuck". So I head down to the tree fort to find that the boy had tied a rope around his waist and is stuck to the tree fort! Gotta love little boys.

He likes to write

Will has taken a huge interest in writing and reading lately. I have to say that I am a little relieved because he previously had shown very little interest and I was starting to wonder if he would learn to love reading and writing or if it would be a chore. Now that he can write he had been making all of us notes. I especially like this note he wrote Catherine tonight to apologize.

Go Will, go!

Last Friday, Jay took the training wheels off of Will's bike. By Saturday he was riding in our driveway and neighborhood, but still needed a little help getting started. By Sunday, he could get started on his own and go up and down hills. This week he has enjoyed riding all over the yard. Go Will, go! Whoohoo!

Singing Praises

On Sunday night, Catherine and Will's choir sang at church. They sang 7 or 8 songs that they had been practicing since January. I have loved hearing them sing and practice for the past few months. They both really love choir. Catherine always loves to perform. And I think this has been great encouragement for Will with his speech and doing an activity with his big sister.

Catherine is always ready to sing. The sweet girl sings with all of her heart. You can hear her over everyone else (which is about 30 kids).

Will loves to sing too, although he gets a little nervous if he knows you're directly watching him. Every now and then he would sneak us a little smile of acknowledgment to us.

They sang their first round of songs and then sat down while the big kid choir sang a few songs. When they went back up to sing the rest of their songs, they weren't quite as organized as they had been the first time. Everyone had gotten out of order, which created a whole new set of distractions. Will especially had an interesting time. His friend Jonah (on the left, Will's right) got really excited with his hand and arm movements and kept smacking Will in the head. Will just kept looking at him with this really confused look, like he couldn't figure out what was going on. Then his friend Red (on the right, Will's left) decided he was tired of singing and started scratching his belly button and pulling his shirt over his head. Will didn't know who to watch, all while he kept trying his best to sing. Jay, Marcy, and I got so tickled by the whole scenario. So did Jonah's parents who were sitting right by us. By the end of this set of songs, we were laughing so much that we were crying. I just kept hoping that Will didn't think we were laughing at him. It was definitely one of those funniest-home-video moments. Too bad we forgot to take our video camera!

Catherine and Will love, love, love their choir teacher, Mrs. Whitley. She is also Will's speech therapist, so they have gotten to see her multiple times every week for the past year. Will has done so well with his speech that we're currently taking a break for a few months and will finish up a few more sounds in the fall. We are so proud of Will and how hard he has worked on his speech. And we are very thankful for Mrs. Whitley and her involvement in our children's lives.