Friday, May 11, 2012

Mother's Day Surprise!

One of my finer moments! :)

Friday, April 20, 2012

From times past

Time sure flies when you have 5 crazy kids. I'm sure it flies anyway.

Future bean counter?

Henry loves playing with the abacus. Could it be his long line of accountants and mathematicians rubbing off on him? I foresee a long and boring future ahead. ;D
Ps...The boys have to do their x's tables on the abacus at grandpa's before their weekly Friday morning breakfast is served. ;)

Wednesday, March 7, 2012

We Ride.

They love these bumper cars!

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Ashley's quite a writer

Here are a few of the things Ashley's written recently. She's so sweet.

Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Ignore if you like

I want to give you the option to ignore my blog if you want. I worry people think its a place for me to brag or something along those lines. If it seems that way...sorry. It's main purpose is to remind me of how cute my kids were when I'm old...or even just older. I also like to share with others who are interested but mainly I want to preserve these moments in time. For instance, I call Holly and Ashley cuddle bunnies. Here is a picture of my cuddle bunny with a quilt her grandpa made. She's taking an unintentional nap....gotta love those.

Title of Liberty

Ashley drew this for family night last night. It's her Title of Liberty. These are things she values that are worth fighting for. I thought it was so cute. Frankly I thought our kids weren't even listening when we asked them to draw this. I won't mention what the other kids drew. :)

What can YOU do in 30 seconds?!

Over the last few weeks Henry and Max have amazed me time and again with what they can do in 30 seconds...unsupervised of course. Here is a list of things they've done.
1. Henry ate half a pack of gum while I was on the computer in the other room for 30 sec.
2. Henry or Max threw a new bottle of children's Tylenol from upstairs over the balcony...shattering the lid and spraying Tylenol everywhere.
3. Max's favorite unsupervised activity is splashing around in the toilet.
4. Max cracked a DVD in half in the time it took me to put another movie in the player...that takes some real determination.
5. Max likes to clear the whole dinner table of all of its contents in 30 seconds.
6. When left unlocked the ice/water dispenser becomes a target. They commonly spray ice everywhere.(picture below)
7. They also both live to rearrange the furniture and then jump from couch to couch...hopefully we don't have to add break leg to this list.

They are certainly busy boys. We have a number of procedures to prevent most of these. The most effective is to yell at any given moment "NO NO!"...that has saved our computer in the library several times. All I hear after that is scurrying and I usually find them with guilty looks sitting on the couch next to the computer desk.

Monday, January 16, 2012

Family fun

For the long weekend we decided to come to St Louis. We originally thought maybe a museum but then noticed we wouldn't freeze to death if we were outside(it was in the 60's). So, outside we went at the zoo. Our kids like it but are always surprised by how much walking they have to do. So sad. Here are a couple pictures of the kids at the zoo. Why do we love the zoo so much? It's free...it forces our kids to get exercise and be outside...and it's free. :)
We also had a late birthday party for Holly with her grandpa and grandma. And as is tradition, we made her look ridiculous and cute for the occasion. Also we play charades as a family a lot these days and while ash and drew get it, Holly thinks of it as some kind of crazy dance party...which is fun to watch. Sorry the picture is blurry but you get the idea.

Thursday, January 12, 2012

The favorite twin

Holly and Henry seem to be the best of pals. I love that they like to play together or rather that Henry allows Holly to boss him and goes along with her shenanigans. But....it has me worried. I thought none of my other kids could tell the twins apart but Holly often seeks out Henry and is successful at finding him. Anyway I think you can guess the problem. What about Max? This isn't the first time a kid in our family has been left out...ash and drew have left Holly out plenty. Anyway, poor Max and of course we encourage including everyone but you know how that goes. I can't imagine being a twin though...so great in some ways but hard in others a constant companion but potentially a constant competitor.

Thursday, January 5, 2012

Christmas time WAS here.

Yes Christmas time has come and gone. What did we do over Christmas? Here you'll get a glimpse. It involved making gingerbread houses. There was of course the hanging of the stockings. There was a lot of sleeping....not for me of course....I preferred staying up late to hang out and chat. The kids enjoyed plenty of quality time with their aunts and uncles who so graciously gave up their rooms for us to sleep in and played endlessly with our kids. We played laser tag....which has become a tradition...Daniel and Nathan obviously have no shame when it comes to their laser tag attire. It was great to get to see the Nelsons and their cute kids. A highlight that I can't skip over is eating at Chik-Fil-A at least 4 times while Daniel's parents and siblings babysat....so nice. Finally, I got to meet my new sister-in-law Lauren....what a treat. Very fun to meet her and get to see Tyler as well. It was sad to leave....Andrew broke down in tears when he got home....which made it even harder. He loves his time in Idaho especially his time with his uncles. Fond memories were made....but now it's back to reality! :)
ps...while in Idaho we contemplated who was the cheapest Ames....a title highly sought after. I'm not sure a conclusion was made but this might give you a clue. On the way home we thought about stopping at the Omaha zoo with our kids. After weighing the costs we decided to take our kids to Cabellas. After all, it has animals....and so what if they're dead and stuffed...it is free and who can argue with that?...not someone who is contending for The Cheapest Ames title.