First day of school 2015

1st grade and 2nd grade.  Can't believe they are getting so old.  There are so many things I want to do and not enough time.  I sometimes wish I could homeschool so we could get more stuff done.  Benson would like to but Sarah loves school.  I'm glad she loves it, I just wish it was easier and cheaper to do things.  

Braves game 2015

I'm getting really bad about taking pictures.  We redid the roof this year while Home Depot was giving out tickets to the Braves for every $100 you spent.  We went to a few games.  Here is Sarah holding at Amelia at one of them.  

Pi day!

Mmmm pizza pie, berry and banana cream pies for pi day!  

Elsie's sweetheart

We went to the Braves game today.  Benson made a sign that it was his birthday and got on the jumbo screen and everyone was telling him happy birthday.  Guest services at the game even gave him a hat and foam tomahawk.  Since it was his birthday and we had an extra ticket we let him invite a friend.  He invited Miles from school.  Elsie followed them around quite a bit and after a few innings when we went to the play area to let them run around we noticed that Elsie and Miles were holding hands.  

then again in the way back to our seats and again after the game.  When Andrew saw he wanted to hold miles hand too and Elsie wouldn't let him.  

At home later we asked her why should wanted to hold his hand and she got embarrassed and kept saying "Stop it, I'm not telling you!"  

Looks like we are in for some trouble.  And Benson is not allowed to have friends over ever again.  

Boston Trip Picture Parade

I'm not sure what this picture is from except that it was December 2014 and three of them were happy to stand next to each other and have a picture taken.  That was rare on our trip.  Someone was always unhappy about something and throwing a fit over it.  Sometimes it was me, but mostly it was one of the kids, I think.  

We went to Boston and followed the freedom trail.  You walk a few miles following this brick trail and see lots of the historical sites of the city.  It was fun, most of the time the kids insisted on walking on the brick trail in a line.  

This was a statue of Paul Revere between his house and the Old North Church.  Benson threw a fit here and sat for awhile, refusing to walk any farther.  

We drove up to Salem for a day and walked around a bit.  there were some cute shops and we got some Halloween decorations and a copy of Wizard of Oz.  

We drove to Maine since we hadn't been there.  We picked a cool island light house to go see.  The view was great, the weather was not.  We didn't get Amelia out of the car, but wanted some proof that she was there so we set her on the dash for a picture.

Andrew did not like getting out of the car in the cold wind and rain.

 Everyone else was cold, but wanted to at least step foot in Maine.

Just before we left they lit up all the Christmas lights on the Lighthouse.  It was cool.  

 We went to Concord and Lexington and got Benson a Looking Glass.  The rest of the kids got some little soldiers.  It was fun to walk around the Lexington green.  

Andrew was not happy having to share the Spy Glass with Benson.  

He was a little happier to ride on Mom's shoulders.  

Amelia was here too, but Matt kept her inside his jacket so she would be warm, and he forgot to open it up for the picture.  

Plymouth rock.  The Mayflower replica was not there since it was winter, but the rock is cool.  

We parked further away than we thought, but since the weather was nice we walked down to see it.  And then it started pouring rain while we were walking.  I don't remember anyone throwing any fits, but Andrew refused to look at the camera, Matt took at least 10 pictures before he gave up and we just don't have one with Andrew looking.  

We went back to Boston so we could tour the U.S.S. Constitution.  We rode the ferry over it it.  

 We had a rough night with Sarah, Andrew, and I all getting pretty sick.  We took it easy in the morning and we were feeling a bit better around lunch so we ventured out to see the last few stops on the Freedom trail.  

Benson was not happy about having to walk from the ferry to the boat so he threw a fit and hid behind Sarah for most of the pictures.  

  On the drive home we stopped for an afternoon in New York.  We went to see the tree at Rockafeller center, it was very crowed.  Matt has the boys and I had the girls, Amelia in a carrier, and Sarah and Elsie by the hands.  Elsie hated it and decided to lay down and almost got trampled by the huge crowds. When she laid down we fell behind Matt and the boys (which was a big deal because I had left my phone in the car and we rode the subway in so we didn't have a way of finding each other if we got seperated)  I made a comment about how she needed to get up so we didn't get seperated and lost.  Sarah heard this and said oh I think I can see dad and dropped my hand and went after them.  I didn't know if I should stay with Elsie so she wouldn't get trampled or go after Sarah so she didn't get lost forever.  I stayed with Elsie.

 People kept trying to help her up because they thought she fell down, and she would just flop back onto the ground.  This was the best picture we got because once I got Elsie up and we were lucky enough to catch up to Matt and the other kids, all I wanted to do was get out of there.

 We continued to walk around but on streets that were not as crowded.  We enjoyed seeing the Christmas lights and decorations.  Sarah was excited to spot the ad the church had a giant ad up in Times Square for the He Is The Gift thing they did this year.  

Manhattan Temple with Mom.  

Manhattan Temple with Dad.  

We also stopped at Valley Forge on the way home.  We enjoyed the visitor center, but didn't realize until it was too late that there were buildings left from during the war that would could have gone through.  We will have to try to go back.  

We drove by the Washington D.C. Temple.  They were having a big Christmas lights festival  It was fun.  Benson threw a fit so we didn't get to walk around as much as I would have liked. But we saw it.

This vacation was a lot of fun.  I really enjoyed most of the week, and I think the kids did too despite all of the fits they threw.  They hadn't done so any fits before on vacation.  Having 4 kids was crazy and the house was messy and I felt like we late for everything for a year.  I remember telling someone 4 kids must be our magic number for chaos because it took a year to settle into that.  Well now I'm thinking 5 kids feels like it must be our magic number for fits.  I don't know if they are crying out for attention or what but it seems like ever since Amelia was born someone is always throwing a fit!      

Sarah turned 6! 2/14/14

 Happy Birthday Sarah!  what a cute princess.  She got a necklace from Grandma and Grandpa and it was wrapped in cash so it was nerve racking to open it.  And she got new tennis shoes that she will have to learn how to tie.  And some Russian and English books which only get read in english.  She got to wear a crow at school all day so everyone knew to tell her happy birthday.  We made heart shaped cookies to take to her class and the kids placed sprinkles by hand one by one on each one to make them beautiful.  And she had a birthday pARTy!  We painted and sculpted and had all kinds of crafty fun.  Her cake looked like an artist's paint palette.

And she is starting to loose teeth all over the place.  We call her gap tooth Sarah!  She loves it, and although the tooth fairy has been very busy she usually makes it by the second night.  

Andrews birthday! 2/13/14.

 Happy Birthday Andrew!  This little cutey turned 1.  It was a year ago but it was alot of fun.  He was nowhere near walking and didn't have teeth yet.  He loved dinosaurs and had a yummy dirt cake with dinos on top.

The little Cutey loved his big blue ball for a birthday present,  All the kids have a good time rolling it around, throwing at each other, and living it out where I trip on it in the middle of the night.