Snow Fun With Daddy!

My boys were very busy in the snow today. They spent countless hours constructing stuff out of the beautiful snow that God sent our way (they are still out there actually). Ty and Darren's two most impressive masterpieces, with snow, were "Frosty the Snowman" and an igloo that fit both Darren and Ty in it. I told Ty I had a hat that replicated the hat Frosty wears in the movie. I think he thought once I "placed it on his head" he would begin to dance around. He was a bit disappointed.

When I say, my "boys", I'm not just speaking of Darren and Ty. I mean Ninja too!!!! Ninja always loves when it snows. He's a snow dog at heart. Watch as he runs away from our house and back to it.

"Annie"

It's so much fun to introduce the toys, movies, stories, and music to your children that were once your favorites. My all time favorite movie was and still is"Annie." I purchased the movie for Ty about 3 months ago. Although he did not enjoy the movie as much as I still do, he really did love it. I was esctatic when I found out that "Annie Jr." was coming to the Mill Mountain theatre, so I quickly jumped on purchasing tickets. We invited Jill, Ashton, and Piper to join us.

The cast consisted of 35 children from all over Roanoke and the New River Valley. Annie was performed by a young girl that attends a school just 4 miles from our home.

If you or your child have never seen the movie, I highly recommend purchasing it for them. It would make a great stocking stuffer at Christmas time ($9.00 at Wal-mart). It's a great way to introduce the topic of adoption. Jill took the topic of adoption a step further after Piper asked her what adoption meant (being "Daddy Warbucks" was going to adopt Annie). She related it to how Christ adopts us into his life!

We really love spending time with the "Higgs". They are such a blessing to our lives.

Christmas Excitement is in the AIR!

We had a few cute ideas for our Christmas cards this year, but unfortunately, it's next to impossible to be successful and fulfill those expectations when you are trying to photograph a rambunctious 4 year-old and two 9 month-old twins. Below are a few photos that Shannon captured of Ty jumping on the bed. Can you tell the "Christmas excitement is in the air"? Shannon, thank you for giving me a second chance :) Being that I am a perfectionist, I know I am a tough cookie to work for.

52 Christmas Activities

For those of you who will be home with your children during the Christmas break, I have a "must buy" for you! It's called 52 Christmas Activities: By, Lynn Gordon. The pictures below pretty much self-explain what this is all about, but I will at least tell you that I purchased them from www.amazon.com I believe they were $6.95 for the stack of 52 cards. I didn't really pay for shipping because I ordered some Christmas items at the same time I placed this order. I knew about this author because I had once received (and still own for anyone who is interested in looking at them) 52 Alternatives to Watching TV and 52 Ideas to Do With Your Toddler. Let's face it, especially for the stay-at-home-moms, our days can be quite a humdrum. So, I do my best to spruce it up a bit. There's only so much hide-and-go-seek and match box cars you can play :) Below is an example of 1 of the 52 cards included in the box.

Let me know if you join in on the fun!

A Sleepover Filled with FUN!

By Webster's dictionary, the true definition of a sleepover is "a house party by which young people spend most of the night talking, eating, etc. etc. etc. It's funny because this is exactly what the night was all about for these two sweet boys. A few weeks back, Ty slept over his friend Nicolas' home. It was nice because Darren and I put the twins to bed at their normal bedtime (6:30 pm) and decorated for Christmas from 6:30 pm - 10:30 pm. The following weekend, we returned the favor to Nicolas' parents and let Nicolas' sleepover.

We started the evening off by allowing the boys to choose where they wanted to eat. Of course, they chose McDonald's. What kid doesn't enjoy a Happy Meal? I took them to Kroger afterwards. I had planned on letting them bake cookies, but they were having so much fun, I don't think they wanted to stop what they were doing to be a mini Martha Stewart. So, we just bought those fantastic tasting sugar cookies that have the frosting on the top of them. The boys played for while before it was time to take a bath. Nicolas' was so funny. When he walked into my bathroom, he said, "Whoa, I've never seen a shower like that before. And why do you have both of these in here?" He was referring to the tub and the shower! I said, "Well, we have both for a night like tonight. You boys wouldn't want to take a shower would you? " He said, "No way. I want to fill up that big tub with lots of bubbles." And that's exactly what they did.

After bath time, I popped them some popcorn and prepared a napkin filled with two frosted cookies. Ty always loves having friends over because mommy bends the rules a bit. We lined the living room rug with blankets, put up a "Meet the Robinsons" tent, and popped in Parent's Trap. Normally, Ty sits through a movie without a peep, but I think he was so excited to have a constant playmate that the silence only lasted about 30 minutes. I allowed the boys to stay up WAY passed their bedtimes. I said, "I allowed", because they even stayed up later than Darren did. HA HA HA

Ty and Nicolas got along wonderfully. They really have become great buddies. I enjoyed Nicolas' company immensely. He is a very intelligent and extremely well behave. It's also nice because they had their "rough housing" times and then they also had times where they could play on an intellectual level (ie. they played UNO and well for 4.5 year olds).

On the side: While we were eating dinner, I cannot remember what we were talking about, but some how the topic of Ty having a crush on Cami. I said, "Ty, can I tell Nicolas' who you have a crush on?" He said, "Yes" bashfully. I said, "Nicolas', Ty has a crush on Cami". Nicolas' just looked at me with a dumbfounded look. And I said, "Do you think anyone is pretty or do you have a crush on anyone?" In his sweet little voice, he said, "Well no. Pretty much I just think my mommy is pretty!" I thought that was so sweet!

He's Back!

This is a MUST buy for those of you who LOVE fun, Christmasy traditions. We adopted this tradition last year and re-introduced it to Ty a few days ago after decorating for Christmas. YES, that's right. We are fully decorated for Christmas. He was so excited to get a revisit from "Nicey". I think we forgot his name briefly though and we have been calling him "Elfie!"

We do try to relate the "Elf on the Shelf" to Christ, so that we continue to keep our Savior in the forefront of his mind at all times. We explained to him that the Elf only watches him, to see if he's being good or bad, for a few weeks leading up to Christmas, but that Jesus is always watching him. I don't see the harm in creating some imaginative fun throughout the holidays!

It retails for $29.95 and if you buy it locally you can save at least $5.95 on shipping/handling. If you didn't get to view our pictures last year when we introduced this tradition to Ty, let me know, I will send you the album which has the captions below each picture, detailing what this "Elf on the Shelf" is really all about.

Ty Finds A New Friend!

The mother guilt has set in BIG time. I just cannot seem to find enough time in my day for a GOOD consecutive hour alone with TY. At most, I get 25 minutes or so. Lately, Ty has made several comments that Darren and I are always too busy to play because we are always feeding babies or changing diapers. Some of that is just Ty playing the violin for himself, but I have to say, my have times changed. I'm sure once brother and sister are a lot less needy, Ty will be so thankful he has not one, but two siblings to play with.

To pacify his loneliness/boredom, Darren spotted a stray kitty, on his lunch break, just hanging out in our garage, so Ty decided to take him under his wing. There is something about the presence of a cat... that seems to take the bite out of being alone . :(

Ty convinced me to feed him milk and cheese in our garage. He went as far as asking me if we could get rid of Ninja (our 14 year old, lovable and very sweet family dog). I told him no. He begged and pleaded. I never gave in to that one. :)

Anyway, enjoy a few pictures of him feeding the kitty and a hilarious video clip of Ty asking me if he could keep BOTH Ninja and the kitty. Is he crazy? I have enough things to take care of.

Material World!

This post is NOT a post about Madonna's song, "Material Girl". Okay, well maybe in a sense it is. Darren and I are trying really hard to instill good values into Ty's life, but sometimes, a four year old can be the most selfish thing in the world. Well, let's say 99% of the day.

Lately, since one of Ty's daily chores consists of getting the mail, he is well acquainted with the abundance of "kids catalogs" (as he likes to call them) that we receive daily. He runs to the mailbox looking for either a package from Gram, as she sends him little trinkets in the mail weekly, or kids catalogs. If he doesn't receive a package from Gram, those catalogs are the next best thing to him AND honestly, for me too! Let me explain:

If a kids catalog comes in the mail, Ty runs indoors, grabs a pen and a pair of scissors. He immediately begins to circle and cut everything out of the catalog that he wants for Christmas. It takes a good 45 minutes for him to go through an entire catalog and cut everything out, which helps me during that stressful time in my day when the babies have to be fed (both bottles and baby food) and I have dinner on the stove/in the oven.

I've tried to explain to Ty that he has WAY too much stuff picked out and that if he's greedy, Santa will bring him nothing. I'm not sure he gets that as you can see from the picture above.

"God's gifts put man's best dreams to shame." ~Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Halloween Brings Out the Fun In Our Home!

Being a christian, you have to be careful how you celebrate Halloween. I'm good at staying away from the wicked stuff, but I do enjoy decorating the house a bit and watching Ty "dress up" and have a little fun being in "costume".

I'm sure Darren would agree, that all these extra pressures I put on myself cause the sign below to usually say, "The Witch Is In" instead of "The Witch Is Out!"

Isn't this mummy so cool! He lives inside Ty's bedroom. If you're out on the town one night, drive by and take a peak. The kids will get a huge kick out of it. Just be sure you visit before 7:45 pm. The lights have to be on in order to view this mummy and lights are out in Ty's room by then.

She Loves Me, She Loves Me Not!

On Sunday, I took the kids to the park. On the walk home, Ty decided to pick some flowers. He proceeded to tell me that he wanted to give them to Cami. She is our pastor's ONLY daughter of 5 kids. Oh BOY! He sure does have his work cut out for him. How will he ever WIN her love while trying to fight off 4 brothers and a VERY strict daddy? I guess now is the best time to start. And flowers are a great place to start. After all, what girl doesn't enjoy fresh cut flowers hand picked from her man! We can always train Ty to fit Nick's standards. :) He also colored her 3 pictures. On Monday, after I brought the flowers to Bible study so her mommy could bring them to her, he came home from school, waited a few hours and said, "Do you think Cami is off the bus yet? Do you think she liked my flowers?" Too Sweet.