Eli is Two!

I have a two year old again. Sweet Eli, you are the cuddliest, funniest, cutest, sweetest little two year old I know. Your kisses and hugs melt the weight of the day right off my shoulders. Thank you for every one that you've ever given me and for all the ones that I know are to come, since you are a cuddler.

Eli, every time I hold you in my arms and "wock" and "sing song" before putting you in the bed, I am amazed at how much my heart loves you. You truly own me. You are the joy and delight of my day. And boy, do you make me laugh, you little turkey! You are always coming up with some way to stir up trouble if nobody is doing anything interesting. You love to have fun!

Your daddy and I can't wait to see who you will become. We know you will be strong and mighty in the Lord. He has spoken that to our hearts from before you were born. You will stand up for right in such a way that people around you will be hungry to follow you in the path of righteousness. You have always been and will always be your own person, leading the way with a sense of humor, joy and passion for life. You are our treasure!

My Little Mathematician

I knew Eli could count to ten, but when he went all the way to fourteen, my mouth dropped open. I said, "Did you just count to fourteen?!"

Then, of course, I had to go through the, "I'm so proud of you!" "Luke, did you teach Eli how to count to fourteen?" (Luke claimed it, even though he doesn't usually get it quite right when he goes past twelve. Letters he knows and loves, numbers have not yet caught his interest.)

Then Eli looked at me and said, "Fiveteen." And this morning, still a little shocked and wondering if I had imagined it all, I said, "Eli, twenty-one..." To which he immediately replied, "Chenty-twoooooo."

If you've ever tried to teach counting, you know that this not quite two year old totally gets the concept of numbers and counting. I'm still in shock and so proud of my little mathematician!

It Is Finished

All four fish are dead. Luke has not woken up from his nap yet, but I am dreading the unavoidable confrontation...

Our New Pets

On Monday, Mrs. Bonnie called to say that Kris' sister, Erica, had given her a fish tank to see if we wanted some new pets. Erica and her family hadn't had very good luck with goldfish and did we want to try for a little while? Mrs. Bonnie and Mr. Eric went to Wal-Mart to buy us some fish and came over to get us set up. Needless to say, the boys are loving it.

Luke feeding his new charges

Keeping Eli off the counter has been a little bit of a challenge.
Sadly, after less than 48 hours, two of the fish went to be with Jesus. I flushed them while the boys were napping, hoping that Luke wouldn't notice. Who was I kidding? He wanted to know where the other two were, and because I was dumb enough to think that he wouldn't ask, I wasn't prepared with an answer. So, I told him the truth, that they had died and I flushed them. You can imagine how well that went over. He poked his lip out, and in a quivering voice said, "You can't put them in the potty!" He didn't even care that the fish were dead, just that I had flushed them.

After some story that I'm sure I stole from Finding Nemo about the fish riding the water back into the ocean to be with their families, he was much better.

I'll keep you posted about how long the other two last.

Spring Break '09

Mama and Daddy came down last Sunday and picked up me, Luke and Eli so we could spend a whole week with them on the "farm". We had a blast, and here are a few pictures. I would love to show all of them, but I'll just pick a few of my favorites.

Luke and David waiting for the egg hunt to get started.

My beautiful niece, Annalee.
Eli's birthday cake.

Luke and Eli's great-grandaddy and my grandaddy, Rudy.

Happy Micah and his mama

Eli stuck to the glue trap. Fortunately, he was the first to visit it.

I know, I should be ashamed. The funny thing is that he never would look at the camera. Mama said, "He kind of looks a little shamed face, doesn't he?" Eli and Rae had fun dressing up as "princesses".

Sweet Harris

Amazingly, the kitties are still alive after all seven grandchildren handling them.

We went to the lake for the weekend. Grandma visited with us on Saturday.

It was a really fun week, and we are so glad we got to go. I'll be putting the rest of the pictures on Facebook. There are too many good ones not to share!

**UPDATE: Here's a link to all the pictures. http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=116443&id=510226534&saved#/album.php?aid=116443&id=510226534**

A Little Bragging and a Little Insight

The beauty of having a blog is that I can brag about things that my children do, even if it means nothing to anyone else, and it is totally okay. Not at all obnoxious, right? Glad we cleared that up.

Here is some of Luke's artwork, and I was completely impressed at how well he stayed in the lines. I understand that staying in the lines is not really important at this age. But I'm just sayin'. And, if this is not art, I don't know what is. (Oh, I colored the tree on the right.)

As for the insight part, we went to the YMCA this morning so I could get some much needed exercise. We got out of the car, and Luke was totally acting crazy, dancing around and singing in his "I'm-so-full-of-energy-that-I-can't-control-myself" voice.

I am thinking, "Oh, no, this is not good." So I get down on my knees (Yes, sort of in a prayer.) and said, "Luke, what do you need?"

He wrinkled his nose and said, "I think I need to do some exercises."

I admit that it rained yesterday and we stayed inside all day long. I also admit that it has been very humid here the past couple of days, and I haven't exactly been very good about making sure the boys get enough outside time. But that is pitiful.

So today when we got home, we played hopscotch, ran sprints, kicked the soccer ball, played baseball, colored outside and had a picnic.