Alice and a Birthday

WE are in full-swing with Alice in Wonderland Practices and mini-performances. Last Saturday (and I can't believe I forgot to post about it before-hand) a group performed at the Pancake breakfast fundraiser. Emma Claire is part of the tears cast - they are Alice's tears that she cries and is "drowning" in. Their costumes were not ready yet, so they all wore blue shirts and jeans. It is going to be SO CUTE! Emma Claire is LOVING the play - she is sad on the days when there is no play practice! It is certainly making her come out of her "shell" - we've had a few problems with her being a little TOO excited at Play Practice - we are talking about it daily and working on it - she just LOVES acting (and she's 5, which makes it very hard to sit still and quiet at 8:00 at night) - but she's doing great!

This Friday and Saturday you can come to the Tuscaloosa Barnes and Noble and any purchase you make, a portion will be donated to the Tuscaloosa Children's Theatre - just mention the Children's Theatre at check out and they will automatically give a portion! There will also be mini-performances by the characters Friday evening and Saturday morning, but that schedule has not come out yet. I will try to let you know more as I find out! If you're in town for the Alabama vs Arkansas game - come by Saturday morning!

The next thing that has happened around here is that Wilson is now 3!!!!!!! I CANNOT believe it - 3 years have just FLOWN by! I really meant to do a special birthday post ON HIS birthday, but as you can see, last Saturday was quite busy. And don't for a second think that because Wilson is the middle child that he would be "forgotten" - belive me when I say that there is NO WAY Wilson would ever let anyone forget him - or even "miss" him for a minute - you always know when Wilson is around - "Mr. Life Personified"!!!! This is especially true at 4:30 in the morning when he's at our bedside saying "Mommy, mommy, mommy I'm hungry, I want to watch a show" over and over and over again - until we get up and do requested task!!! It's a good thing I'm a morning person - not so good for Will some mornings when I'm already out the door for a run at 4:45 and THEN Wilson wakes up and it's all up to DADDY to deal with him!!!! Heee heee - I love it when I can make it out the door before Wilson wakes up! Hopefully one day he'll be my faithful running partner each morning.

(notice the eye patch on Emma Claire's left eye - this is part of her treatment to cover the "good eye" up at least 3 hours each day in order to strengthen the "weak" eye.)

Do you think he was excited about all the attention and cake he was getting?

Happy Birthday Sweet, Energetic, Concerned, Fiery, Sensitive, Caring, Beautiful, Ill-Tempered, Smart, Silly, Wild, Loveable, Tiny Wilson !!!!

(see what I mean by Life Personified??)

I love you dearly, even though you are my greatest struggle right now. But our greatest stuggles are what brings us closer to Jesus, and for that I am thankful for each and every moment I have with you!

Kitchen Re-do

In the last week, my kitchen has gone from THIS:

To THIS:

Just a lot of PAINT, LOTS.OF.PAINT!!!! And cleaning and priming and OIL PAINT - Oh it's pretty and shiny and durable, but WHAT.A.MESS!!!!! I did it though, all by myself, with only the help of Will to take off some hardware and put it back on. Blood, sweat and tears I tell you!

It's done for now, I'd eventually like to Glaze the cabinets, but I may need to be taught, first of all, and then practice on something a little less permanent and "center stage"

It just feels clean and sleek to me. I love it!

Dirty Fun!

One evening last week, after dinner, I sent the boys to the backyard to play while I cleaned up the kitchen, and this happened...

Now, don't think he did this to himself....the little sneaky culprit was just around the corner...dressed in his usual at- home attire - saggy underwear, b/c none is made small enough (with the appropriate super heros that he adores) to fit his 23 pound little hiney...guilty as charged....

He decided to make Henderson feel a little better by throwing dirt on his own head!

And Daisy helped in starting that nice dirt hole there in the corner!

Boys will be Boys!

Yea Alabama!

We headed out to the quad in normal fashion on Saturday! Don't you love how we turn a double stroller into a triple? And it's suprisingly easy to push too!

Nana with the grandchildren (minus Stanton - he stayed at home)

My 3 busy bees! It was a beautiful day - albeit a little humid - but the children were ALL great and had a fabulous time!

The view from our tent!

A nearby friend!

Chow time! I think Emma Claire had 4 plates of food, while the boys ate nearly nothing (except for a tasty RED treat, you'll see soon!)

Roll Tide friends!

Mommies!

Just a game of cards on the quad!

Looks like they are posing for a middle school dance picture!!!!

Trouble!

People watching, or solving the world's problems?

That tasty RED treat!

All the children enjoyed a game of Freeze Tag - and this is how they "un-freeze" each other!

Lots of love and laughs!

The best family shot we got!

Our babysitter, Cody, from this summer walked by - the children LOVED her - she was truly a God-send! She just pledged Chi O at The University and is busy busy, so we don't see her much anymore. Hopefully we can have her back soon, Wilson still asks about her some mornings, "Is Cody coming to play today?" So sweet!

I think Henderson was afraid I was going to leave him

He chose to just lay on the ground with his football instead!

WE rushed over to the Elephant Stomp just in time to catch Big Al right before he left to go in the stadium!

Roll Tide!

Sorry for the lack of posts lately, but with Emma Claire's busy schedule with school and play practice and my work and well, just having 3 small children at home, it's hard!

Hopefully I'll have a new post soon on the renovation (well, painting) I'm doing to our kitchen (all by myself). It's quite a task - all those cabinets and windows and that icky oil-based paint!!! But I know it will be well worth it when I'm all done!


Here are some BEFORE pictures from last Christmas - it' s not a bad look, but the yellow was starting to get on my nerves and the white cabinets - Oh My! I've cleaned and cleaned and cleaned and could not get those things cleaned to my satisfaction. They needed to be re-painted regardless, so I figured why not change the whole look and do it all? Hopefully I'll be through sometime this week (which will be great considering I just started on Friday!)