Bathtime: Brother and Sister Style

Caleb and Ariel had their first real bath together tonight. They had so much fun together spashing and giggling! I have a feeling that this will be the start of a really WET bathroom when bathtime comes around!

Discovering Rollie Pollies

Caleb came across a piece of bark in the back yard today that had a bunch of Rollie Pollies on it and he thumped on the ground and about 20 of them came crawling all over the back porch. he thought it was the coolest thing and kept calling them snails. Even after dinner tonight he wanted to go out and play with the "snails" again. He also informed me that he "squished" one with his foot!

Sunday Afternoon With Family

Granny and Grandad took Caleb over the weekend so that Dan and I could go to the Dance on Saturday night. They met Dan, Dan's sister Amy, Ariel and I at church on Sunday morning and then after service we all came back to the house and had pork roast, potatoes, carrots, and all the fixings for lunch (got to love the crock pots!). After lunch we all sat on the front porch and played in the yard with...the exception of Dan and Grandad loading the trailor with what junk we had laying around in the yard from our construction. We had a great time sipping iced tea and watching Caleb play.

Big Band Dance

Dan and I went to another Big Band Dance on Saturday night with Caleb and Leah Mitchell and Clint and Mandy Bean. We had a great time being with friends and dancing the night away. We always look forward to these moments!

Scrapbook Images

Here are a few more images that I thought that I would share with you!

Macro Pics

I have been messing around with my camera the past few days and I have taken a few macro shots that I thought I would share with you. I am still trying to learn.

Planting Shrubs

Yesterday Dan, Caleb and I plated some shrubs in our back patio flower bed. I am sure that most of you know that our house has been a work in progress for the past 4 years and we are just now getting around to putting some greenery outside and adding some curb appeal. The sad part about it is that Dan is a lisenced landscape architect now and we don't even have the yard to show it! Dan has come up with some beautiful plans though and I am sure that within the next few years our yard will look spectacular!

Caleb really enjoyed working in the yard. He would take his bucket and fill it with dirt and then go and toss it in the flower bed. When we had everything finished he watered the plants...he was filthy and wet by the time we got done. All he wanted to do when we got inside was to get under the covers on the couch and get "nice and cozy" as he calls it!

Dan is also building a fence on the side of our patio to match the one that he built the first summer that we were here. This is to keep Chance from digging up all the flowers and shrubs that we will plant and to also give us an area to enjoy without having mud all over the place since Chance likes to dig holes in our clay dirt.

Digging in the Peet Moss

Helping Daddy place them just right

Giving it the final touch!

Happy Easter!

The kids were visited by the Easter Bunny on Saturday night. Caleb was of course more excited about his basket than Ariel was, but she did play with a few things in her's as well. Dan, the kids and I went to church early yesterday. I had to sing in choir both services so I had to be there early in order to get fitted for a choir robe and to have a quick rehearsal before service. We sang an Easter Medly consisting of four songs (He Arose, Arise my Love, What a Great God of All is He, He Lives) The medley was sung after this video...I found on YouTube to share with you. It was pretty amazing and it sounded awesome!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9J9enYEd1M

Dan volunteered to work in childcare during second service since I was going to be in choir. He was so sweet to help, I know that they are always looking for more volunteers. We got home at 12:45 and then around 2:30 we had lunch. I put a pork roast in the crockpot before church and I cooked some "rustic" mashed potatoes as Dan calls them (they are just red potatoes mashed with the skins on) and some corn. I also baked a carrot cake before we had lunch! It was so good that we really didn't eat dinner last night before going to bed.

Here are some pictures!

Caleb was so excited about the Easter Bunny coming!

Ariel was trying to grab her basket as we were trying to take pictures before church. We didn't get any pictures of Dan and Caleb because they drove seperate from Ariel and I and they weren't even dressed when we left.

Here is Caleb licking the beaters from the carrot cake that I was baking.

Hunting Easter Eggs in 35 Degree Weather

The First Baptist Church at Springdale had an annual Easter egg hunt today. They are the sister church to the Church at Pinnacle Hills that we attend. I am sure that when they planned for this Easter egg hunt that it was 70-80 degrees outside like it was a week and a half ago but today the high was around 35! We went ahead and took Caleb and Ariel and we met with our connection group from church since we will not be having group tomorrow night. We had a great time considering the temperature. I bundled Ariel up as much as I could and just left her in the stroller the whole time so that she would stay as warm as possible. They had free hot dogs, chips, cookies and drinks. They also had 5 or 6 inflatables for the kids to play on. Needless to say, Caleb took a great nap this afternoon along with Ariel...they both slept for over two hours at the same time!

And they're off! Caleb was so disappointed to see all the kids picking up all the eggs that he was trying to run for. He almost cried at one point but Dan went with him and held his hand and they were able to get 2 whole eggs out of hundreds that were on the ground. He was happy about the two that he got though!

There he is in the red coat and navy blue hoodie...scoping out some eggs! And there's Olivia in the pink.
We got two eggs Mommy!
There they are...what a big basket for two whole eggs!

6 Months Already!

Brother and Sister

Look at that orange nose from her sweet potatoes!
Sitting at the highchair playing with some fruit puffs...she doesn't know to eat them yet.
She looks a lot like Caleb sleeping here.
Ariel is 6 months old today. She is still not sitting up on her own. She doesn't seem like she is any hurry either. She will sit in the corner of the couch with the boppy behind her and play but when it comes to sitting on her own, she still falls forward and gets in what they call the tripod where her hands are straight in front of her and she is bending over while sitting.

She is eating fruit (usually pears) in the morning for breakfast and is also eating a veggie (carrots, sweet potatoes or squash...which leaves her nose orange as you can see in the pictures!) for dinner mixed with rice cereal. I am trying to introduce the sippy cup to her with a little bit of juice to help her digestive system. She gives us this huge "bitter beer" face when she is drinking it since it is so diluted with water and just a hint of juice.

She is still sleeping great at night. I usually get her to sleep by nursing her around 9:00 and she will usually sleep until around 4 or 5 am nurse again and then wake up sometime around 8:00. She still is not taking the pacifier a whole lot. I do have it near by just in case because sometimes she will take it and it is usually the moments when I need her to take it the most.

Still no teeth yet. I have felt a little bump on her lower gum for the past few weeks and she tends to be a little bit fussy when she is chewing on her toys here lately. She still drools like crazy but she has done that for months.

Overall she is still just the happiest baby ever. Still doesn't cry much unless I walk away from her and then when I look back at her and say "Whatcha crying for?" she will just give me the biggest grin ever. She is a joy to have! And big brother loves her to pieces!

New Digital Scrapbooking Images

Here are a few new pages that I have done for my digital scrapbook. I am learning more and more with each page and it is so much fun!

Our Trip down to Dallas

On Friday morning I met Dan's mom and his sister in Fayetteville to have lunch and to do some shopping at the mall. Once we were done shopping, We parted ways and I left Dan's mom in the care of Caleb for the weekend while Dan, Ariel and I went to Dallas. I quickly rushed home and packed the bags and then we were on our way at around 4:00 which would have put us in Dallas at around 10:00. We stopped at our normal spot in McAlester, Oklahoma to eat dinner and to feed Ariel and change her. Up until this point we had both daylight and no rain and by the time we got done eating it started to pour and it was dark outside which made driving conditions terrible.

We were making pretty good timing considering the rain until we hit Atoka, Oklahoma about 50 miles south of McAlester. Dan was driving and we ended up hitting a HUGE water puddle on the right side of the road and as soon as that happened the battery light on the van came on. Dan thought that the sensors on the battery must have just gotten wet until the temp gage went all the way to hot and the power steering went out. Fortunately we were in a town and not in the middle of nowhere.

We pulled over to a small gas station called "Buddy's Gas Stop" and Dan and I sat there and prayed and thought about the best thing to do. We looked to the left of us and two buildings down there was a hotel....hallelujah! I was pleased to know that we wouldn't have to stay in the van all night with a 6 month old baby! Of course my husband was bound and determined to get to the problem so he got out in the pouring rain and looked under the hood. The main driver belt had slipped off the tension pulley. The belt was in excellent condition and there was no show of wear on it.

Dan needed tools though and we had none. He went in "Buddy's" and asked if they had any crescent wrenches that he could use and they had none. He went to the gas station next to "Buddy's" and also to the hotel and they didn't have any either. Dan looked to the right of us and saw a "Love's " gas station that truckers use and thought that they would probably have some tools. He took the belt all the way off and I was so nervous! Dan said that we would be able to make it to the "Love's" gas station without the belt on since it was only about a tenth of a mile down the street. I wasn't convinced though. I kept thinking about being farther away from the hotel that was so conveniently located to the left of us and didn't want to get any further away from it. I asked Dan to go inside and see if he could call "Love's" to see if they had any tools there before we traveled away from the hotel.

He went inside "Buddy's" and talked to the clerk and he said that just on the other side of "Love's" there was a Wal-Mart and they would probably have the tools that Dan needed. Thank goodness for Sam Walton! So we went southbound to Wal-Mart and made it just fine with no power steering, almost no charge in our battery and with the temp gage on H.

Dan went in and out of Wal-Mart 4 or 5 times to find the right size of crescent wrench but he found but wasn't able to get the tensioner on the pulley to let him get the belt back on without having an extra hand. I went out and helped him the best I could in the pouring rain by holding the huge golf umbrella and the flashlight. Dan climbed up onto the front end of the van and that is when a gentleman pulled up and asked Dan if he needed help. Of course Dan didn't turn an extra hand down so the gentleman got out of his car and came and helped Dan and within 10 minutes they had the belt on!!!

It took two hours total in the rain but we ended up back on the road at 11:00 heading toward Dallas again. We made it to my Aunt's house at 1:00 and we no problems after that. I love being married to a man who is determined to at least try when we are in a tight situation.

Ariel by the way did excellent while we were stranded in Wal-Mart parking lot. I fed her her dinner, changed her clothes, and then nursed her to sleep and by the time we got to my Aunt's house all I had to do was put her in her pack-n-play. I was really glad that we didn't have Caleb, he would have been bored out of his mind and I know that he had WAY more fun at his Granny's house!

Conquering the BIG D!

Dan, Ariel and I left for Dallas last Friday for the "Big D" Dallas Marathon. Dan has been training to run this marathon for 5 months or so and we were all so excited for him to meet this goal in his life. I was so proud of him! He was 106th place overall and was in the top 100 for the men. He was very sore afterwards to say the least but was very pleased with the timing that he did. At about mile 20 his body started rejecting the running and he had to walk quite a bit towards the end. 26.2 miles is a long way to run...way to go DAN!