Update

Almost every night when I go to bed there’s an outfit laying on my bed.  Anna’s newest hobby is coordinating everyone’s outfits.  Along with a shirt and pants there’s always a pair of earrings and a necklace to match.  I think it’s really cute and I try to go along with it most of the time, but I’ve realized that what I wear each day is something I really like to choose for myself.   I keep trying to explain that nicely.  Anna’s teacher had her class write an essay as they prepare to leave elementary school behind forever.   The students will get to read their essay to their parents on the last day of school, but the teacher chose one to read to all the parents and she chose Anna’s!  I’m so proud of her, and I love what a great writer she is.  We love Anna.

Abigail is loving her rehearsals for “The King and I”.  She just found out that she gets to be in the Uncle Tom’s Cabin scene or as she calls it, “the really weird part.”  She loves it because she gets to shake and then die dramatically while they carry her off stage.  I cannot wait to see all of this.  If Abby isn’t playing with a friend or playing with her Webkinz on the computer she is tending to her American Girl dolls, she puts them in pajamas each night and tucks them in.   She also takes great care of Patches, our guinea pig.  Evidently Anna recorded the day we got him in her journal, May 30th, so they’ve decided that’s when we’ll celebrate his birthday.  Abby has been reminding me for 2 weeks to buy extra fruits and veggies so she can make Patches a special salad for his birthday present.  She’s such a nurturing little character.  We love Abby.

As Nate walked in from school the other day he smiled and excitedly said, “Mom, I didn’t get in trouble once today!”  “Uh, so is that abnormal?”  “Well, kind of, people make me laugh” he said as he shrugged his shoulders.  Oh dear.  Nate is turning 7 in a few weeks and is dying for a pocket knife, what age do you give a child a knife???  Why do boys always have to be risking their lives to have fun?   When he’s  not teasing or tormenting his sisters or Ben, he’s being as sweet as can be to Joshua.  He adores him.  It always cracks me up when he brings a friend home and brings them right in to see Joshy and tells them all about his latest trick or tooth or whatever.  The friends usually don’t care at all, but that doesn’t deter Nate one bit.  We love Nathan.

Tonight Ben put a plastic pitcher on his head and said, “Mom, look I’m a hippo-nocerous!”

I laughed so hard.  I think I wrote about how a few weeks into soccer he decided he’d really play and even scored a goal.  Since then pretty much every day often several times a day he’ll say, “Mom, memember when I scored that goal?”  with a big grin on his face.   We love Benjamin.

Our little 10 month old is still not quite crawling but is oh-so close.   He doesn’t army crawl, but he does do this weird pivot, sit, pivot sit thing and is remarkably proficient at it.  He can cover a fair amount of distance very quickly.  He’s still got plenty of chubs on him, but sadly, is kind of growing into it.  He doesn’t really look ridiculous anymore, okay his thighs are still ridiculous, but I feel like they’re melting away a little bit.  Sigh.  He’s just a pure tub of love.  We love Joshua.